


On Your Love

by Cbear2470



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Actor Katsuki Yuuri, Actor Victor Nikiforov, Alternate Universe - Actors, Best Best Friend Phichit Chulanont, Comedy, Eros Katsuki Yuuri, Fluff and Humor, Friends to Lovers, M/M, Oblivious Heartbreaker Katsuki Yuuri, Pining Victor Nikiforov, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-11-18
Updated: 2019-03-02
Packaged: 2019-08-25 05:51:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 31,694
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16655422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cbear2470/pseuds/Cbear2470
Summary: Yuuri Katsuki was the kind of person you didn’t think about until you saw him dressed up.Then he was the kind of person you never stopped thinking about again....Even though he's keeping no secrets, at times since his breakthrough role inThe Ice Masterlast year, Yuuri Katsuki has been starting to feel like he's leading a double life. A divide between Yuuri Katsuki, the awkward human disaster, and Yuuri Katsuki, suave and charismatic rising star, seems to have come into existence, and Yuuri cannot figure out for the life of him how or why. Particularly because as far as Yuuri is concerned, the suave and charismatic rising star version of himself does not exist.But it's terrifying, none the less.But most terrifyingly of all, for some reason Yuuri's idol turned co-star, the legendary Victor Nikiforov, has gotten it in his head that Yuuri is, in fact, the effortlessly cool superstar one out of the two of them. And Yuuri just can't seem to correct the misunderstanding.





	1. The Role of a Lifetime (Or, Yuuri Katsuki Would Like for You to Please Send Help)

**Author's Note:**

> So, I've been doing this thing where I try my hand at writing all my favorite YOI AU's, because I'm of the mind there are just never enough. And guess what it's time for? That's right, an Actor AU.

Yuuri Katsuki was the kind of person you didn’t think about until you saw him dressed up.

Then he was the kind of person you never stopped thinking about again.

The problem was, though, that despite the increasing number of stylists willing to work with the rising star—the number that sent him clothes in the mail, that had offered to let him keep clothes after photoshoots, or wanted a contract signed stating that he’d wear their design to his next red carpet—on an average day, Yuuri Katsuki did not dress particularly nicely.

In fact, he tended to dress like a teenage boy. And not the kind of teenage boy who was obsessively into designer streetwear. Or even the kind of teenage boy who for some reason insisted on wearing a suit for any occasion that remotely called for it. More like that kind of teenage boy who could be spotted running through a high school hallway, clutching a massive stack of books to their chest.

You know, the kid that wore the same cargo pants, hoodie, and tattered messenger bag every single day?

Yuuri Katsuki was that kid.

Except now he was 23 and well on his way to becoming a millionaire, even if the latter thing was fairly recent.

And sure, the messenger bag was now made out of leather (a gift from his sister after landing his first role) and the cargo pants were replaced with jeans (because his college roommate and best friend Phichit had threatened to refuse to be seen with him in public otherwise). But the hoodie was still just a hoodie.

And this is very likely the very reason that why the one time Yuuri Katsuki had met (i.e. been caught staring at) his idol, Victor Nikiforov, in an airport, the man had mistaken Yuuri for just another doting fan and had offered to take a photo with him.

And Yuuri, who had idolized Victor since the other man first came to stardom as teenage heart throb a decade ago, had ignored the international superstar and run off to his gate, sans photo.

Because you see, Yuuri Katsuki was, at that point in time, technically speaking _not_ just a fan.

If he _had_ been just a fan, maybe he would have taken the photograph. (Maybe.)

But the thing was, on that particular day, Yuuri was flying back to L.A. from New York after finally finishing off a large press tour for that holiday seasons hottest blockbuster action movie that had just premiered last weekend, and in the days since had already grossed $200 million dollars worldwide and had an 87% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. A movie in which Yuuri Katsuki coincidently had a rather large part in.

But Victor Nikiforov, apparently, didn’t know that.

Not that he should, of course, Yuuri recognized. The man was probably far too busy with his own life to see other people’s movies. And it was Yuuri’s first role, basically ever. And it wasn’t like Yuuri was the lead or anything—his character the computer hacker side-kick to the lead bad-ass action hero. A Q, not a Bond, if you will.

So there was absolutely no reason for Victor to have seen the movie. No reason to Victor to remember Yuuri’s face, even if he had. And certainly no reason for him or anyone who may have even seen the movie to be able to recognize the Yuuri that had appeared on screen with the Yuuri that stood gaping in the airport.

Because, well, Yuuri’s character had been carefully well-dressed in a kind of messy, nerdy, chic—lots of button downs with the sleeves rolled up, stylish glasses, and neatly styled hair. And the real life Yuuri had been up since 4 a.m. that morning to catch a flight, had run out of clean clothes three days ago and was currently wearing the same stained t-shirt he’d been sleeping in, and had also incidentally lost his comb in London last week and hadn’t bothered to acquire a new one and was pretending that bedhead look was one he could pull off.

But it was still terribly embarrassing and degrading, none-the-less, Yuuri felt. And so he’d vowed to never think, nor speak, of the incident again.

It probably wouldn’t even be that hard, anyway, Yuuri assumed. It’s not like Yuuri Katsuki was ever going to land another role.

He’d probably be washed up out of Hollywood by the time summer rolled around.  

*

Yuuri did not, technically speaking, know how to audition.

It’s not that he hadn’t ever read for anything at all, of course he had.

Once.

At least, only once had he read actually knowing that auditioning was what he was doing.

But the first and last movie that he had been cast in, he’d been selected during an international casting call. And at that point, he’d only ever acted once, technically speaking, and he certainly hadn’t auditioned for anything.

And it’s not like he hadn’t wanted to, act that is, of course. Don’t for a second think that anyone managed to accidently rope Yuuri along into this kind of career. The man may have been a master of self-deprecation and self-doubt, but he _had_ always wanted to be an actor.  

But it was a _secret_ dream of his.

Until he’d been cast in _The Ice Master_ early in the year, Yuuri had, in fact, assumed his dream of acting was like that secret dream of being a figure skater that he also had. You know, that dream that grew incredibly intense every time the Winter Olympics rolled around, but that was obviously never going to happen because Yuuri had made a solid dent into his twenties and still only went skating a handful of times every winter.

So of course he’d assumed acting was supposed to be like that—a missed opportunity that he’d never really intended on working towards. A fantasy, if you will.

But the reality of it was that Yuuri had been 22 years old and a college senior at a university outside Detroit set to graduate with a double major in Communications and Computer Science. If he was actually going to be an actor, he would have gone to school is LA. He would have studied drama.

He would have, you know, actually tried basically at all.

But the fact of that matter was, was that Yuuri had pretty awful anxiety, so the idea of auditioning and performing in plays at his university in Detroit filled him with terror. And the idea of going to school and constantly being graded on his ability to successfully pretend to be a human being made him feel ill.

So instead he took dance classes at the college’s studio and gave the one recital at the end of every semester pretending he was dancing in an empty room. And then there was that one time where a very desperate film student had been looking for someone to act in their short film and Yuuri had timidly agreed on the notion that he was just doing a favor and he probably wouldn’t be good. (The film went on to win an award at a national competition, but Yuuri assumed that was because of the superb editing—despite the fact that the award was literally for best performance in a leading role).

But then, one day everything changed, as it inevitably always does (although rarely quite like this).

Because Yuuri had decided to tell exactly one person on the entire planet about his secret fantasies of acting. And he made the mistake of that person being Phichit Chulanont.  

Because of course, when Yuuri Katsuki’s number one fan, supporter, and best-best friend, Phichit heard news of an upcoming film doing a world-wide casting call for “diverse” actors, Phichit had put together the worlds most pathetic reel of Yuuri’s short film credit and a video of a few of his dance recitals, attached his senior photos as headshots, and sent it in.

All without telling Yuuri, of course. (Because Yuuri would have said _absolutely_ not.)

But then, about a month later and for god knows what reason, Phichit, who’d put himself down as Yuuri’s representation, got a call.

And then Phichit was emailed a script and in their little apartment in Detroit, he somehow conned Yuuri into filming him doing a reading of it—all while still not telling Yuuri exactly what was going on—and sent it back off the casting.

And then another week went by and another call came, and a Skype call with a couple casting directors was set up.

Now that one was a bit trickier for Phichit to keep Yuuri in the dark about.

But he’d still managed to none the less.

Obviously.

And so Yuuri was fed a story about how some graduate student friends of his had this experimental unscripted film project that they needed some footage of a pretend interview for. And since Yuuri was technically speaking one of the universities only award-winning actors, he should do them the favor. Phichit made it easy—told him that all Yuuri would have to do is take a skype call and act like he was auditioning, and they’d film it on their end and send Yuuri a copy of the final project in another couple months.

And so Yuuri spoke with real casting directors, acting like he was acting.

Then two more days went by, and Phichit got a third call.

But this time, Yuuri was wanted in LA for a real live screen test and to do a reading with some of the actors they’d cast so far. And so Phichit had to come clean.

But after a fair deal of yelling and crying, almost entirely on Yuuri’s part, they bought a pair of last-minute tickets to LA.

And so Yuuri showed up at a studio, which turned out to be the most intimidating conglomeration of non-descript buildings Yuuri had ever seen, to audition. And Yuuri honestly didn’t know how auditions usually worked, but he’d come to find out later, usually they don’t stick you in a room for ten minutes with the lead actor, have you read a scene, tell you you’re free to go, and then call you back in less than an hour to offer you a part.

But apparently, he and Christophe Giacometti, who’d already been cast as the lead, had just really hit it off, or something.

But it was why, now almost a year later, as Yuuri stood in a room with a couple of bored looking casting directors, a single camera boring into his soul, Yuuri felt completely out of his depth.

He had a real agent now, an Italian man called Celestino, who after Yuuri had ridden out the wave of _The Ice Master_ , had decided Yuuri needed to start going out on auditions to look for his next gig.

And yes, Yuuri Katsuki may have, again, _technically speaking_ received more critical acclaim in his short career than nearly everyone else who sat in the waiting room waiting to audition on that particular day of his first actual audition. But that didn’t mean Yuuri was _confident_.

Because the thing was, Yuuri was terribly aware that he didn’t know any of the technical aspects of acting. He didn’t know certain techniques, none the less did he purposefully practice any of them. He’d never even taken an improv class, for crying out loud. Everyone who lived in LA in their twenties and fancies themselves an aspiring, well, any industry related job has _at least_ taken an improv class. He was sure every single thing he did was some kind of Acting 101 faux-pas.

But despite his complete lack of technical prowess, the one thing Yuuri did know how to show his emotions. He knew how to _perform_ —he’d learned that through dance. He learned that from wanting to be able to bury himself so deeply in a role that he forgot who Yuuri Katsuki even was.

And so that’s what he did.

And then he got a call back.

And then he got the part.

*

“Why are we still roommates, again?” Phichit asked, flopping backwards over the armrest of the couch.

“Do you want to move out?” Yuuri asked, his brow furrowing, as he looked over the kitchen island and across into the living room where Phichit was now hanging upside-down off the couch. “I was barely even here the first six months we lived here, and I’m about to barely ever be here anymore again.”

“No, of course not,” Phichit said quickly, placing his hands down on the ground and kicking his feet up as he flipped himself off the couch with a soft thud. “The only way I’d ever get to live in a place like this paying as little as I do in rent is if I became a houseboy,” Phichit said as he stood up, gesturing around Yuuri’s modest but slick modern Echo Park apartment that Yuuri had hastily leased after getting cast in _The Ice Master_ last year.

He’d honestly been too freaked out about the whole actually being an actor in a find of massive highly anticipated film to really pay much attention to the apartment hunting process though and had ended up with a much nicer place that the typically too-sensible Yuuri Katsuki would have chosen under normal circumstances. Phichit, who was helping in the apartment hunting process, may have had something to do with that.

“You say that as if you’ve given it some thought,” Yuuri said, his voice deadpan, but clearly teasing. “So what’s the problem then?”

“Well I mean,” Phichit shrugged, “You signed a deal for your second major motion picture in just over a year today and instead of going out and partying and bringing back some model with more abs than previously thought physiologically possible to your bachelor pad, you’re making your fabulous but admittedly not remotely A-list roommate katsudon and will probably be in bed by nine. We could have at least ordered in or something!”

“My mother’s recipe is better than any of the Japanese restaurants that will deliver here, you know that,” Yuuri defended. “And Cary Grant had a roommate for over a decade right through the height of his career—um, what’s his name,” Yuuri said, turning back to the task at hand and absentmindedly scrambling eggs in a bowl with a pair of chopsticks before pouring them into the pan.

“Yeah, and they were definitely fucking,” Phichit said as he walked into the kitchen. “And you, sir, have made a point of not fucking me,” he said, leaning up against the counter, crossing his arms over his chest, and looking at Yuuri pointedly.

“That rumor has been vehemently denied by basically every living relative of either of them,” Yuuri said, ignoring the second thing all together. “Can’t we celebrate platonic male friendship? I was literally just cast in a movie about that.”

Phichit rolled his eyes.

“Well of course, lest we forget the currently untitled bro-drama, my platonic love,” he said, coming to stand behind Yuuri, wrapping his arms around his waist and resting his chin on Yuuri’s shoulder. “But when a comedian makes a joke you’re gay and you sue him for slander, you’ve obviously got some kind of issues that need to be worked out.”

“That was in the 1980’s, Phichit, there was obviously a lot—” Yuuri started and then sighed, giving the pan one more shake before turning off the burner. “I’m kind of over the Cary Grant biography fact-off.”

“So you’re saying I won?”

Yuuri elbowed Phichit in the ribs

Phichit groaned and dramatically stumbled backwards.

“Oh, great show of platonic male friendship there Yuuri,” Phichit said, rubbing his side. “I can just feel the love.”

“If you don’t go sit down at the table for dinner, I’m going actually move out—good luck being approved to take over the lease without my two major motion picture signing bonuses.”

“Okay, Mr. Sassy-Pants,” Phichit pouted. “Can’t we at least eat on the couch and watch some Netflix though like normal 21st century humans?”

“Is this you setting up an entry into some kind of in very poor taste Netflix and chill joke to go along with your long running Yuuri Katsuki won’t sleep with me bit? Because we can have sex if it ends this torment.”

“First of all,” Phichit scolded. “You don’t mean that, you horrible tease,” he pouted.

Yuuri groaned. (Although of course it was true.)

“And second of all,” Phichit said with a far too proud of himself grin, “Yuuri, honey, baby, I don’t need to set up Netflix and chill jokes when you insist on having _candlelit dinners_ with your platonic male roommate,” Phichit said, gesturing dramatically at the little glowing decorative candle holders in the middle of the kitchen table.

“They are just a couple of tealights!” Yuuri defended, his tone exasperated. “They make it cozy,” he added, his voice smaller now.

“Yeah, and you want to know why a person under usual circumstances tries to make a room feel cozy when they’re having dinner with someone?”

“I imagine you’re going to tell me?”

“Because it sets off a chain reaction of sorts,” Phichit said, complete with hand gestures to demonstrate how serious he was in laying down the _facts_. “It activates our primitive caveman brain parts that makes us want to curl up with someone in front of a fire and fuck.”

“I feel like that explanation is neither anthropological nor scientific.”

Phichit rolled his eyes.

“Okay, but if a pap got a picture of us sitting at your candlelit table eating dinner together—what would the headline read?”

“First of all, paparazzi do not care about someone like me, and second of all I wouldn’t care, because I, unlike Cary Grant, am secure in my sexuality and masculinity.”

“Oh,” Phichit said, quirking an eyebrow, the devil smile returning, “And then what would you do if the media found out about the secret Victor Nikiforov poster stash wallpapering your closet?”

Yuuri’s eyes widened and he blushed almost violently before shoving Phichit’s bowl of food at him and walking over to the couch to sit down in defeat.

Phichit followed after him, smiling victoriously and picking up the remote.

“So which season of The Great British Bake-Off do you want to rewatch?”

*

Yuuri woke up to the sound of his phone ringing.

“Hai?” he mumbled as he answered it, rubbing his eyes tiredly.

“I’ve got some news about the currently untitled film,” Celestino said down the line.

Yuuri’s stomach dropped and he immediately sat up.

“They’d dropped me,” Yuuri said. “Right? I’ve been recast.”

“No—although you’re close, sort of,” Celestino said, and Yuuri did not feel remotely reassured. “Apparently  contract negotiations for the leads went haywire yesterday.”

“I thought J.J. and Guang Hong were basically locked down?”

“Apparently not. They were expecting for Leroy to ask for the moon, he always does, but apparently he wanted the stars this time too and they couldn’t cut a deal. And Ji was offered a role in a film that is being directed by a promising young director who is a friend of his, and so he decided to drop as well.”

Yuuri sighed and swung his legs over the edge of the bed. There was still a lot Yuuri had to learn about the film industry, but a movie with both leads dropping out when they were due to start rehearsals in only a few weeks did not bode well for this film, Yuuri had a feeling.

“So, do they have any idea who they’re going to get to replace them?”

“Well, Yuuri, that’s the thing,” Celestino said, taking a long breath that made Yuuri stop breathing, “They’d like you for Guang Hong’s role.”

Yuuri’s stomach felt like fire and ice all at once.

“What?”

“They want you for the role of Neil Reilley.”

Yuuri’s mind was spinning. He was happy with another secondary character role. It was less pressure. As a secondary character, if you were good, people might write you a sentence in their review. If you were mediocre though, they probably just wouldn’t mention you.

As a lead though, Yuuri would have to face scrutiny. He’d be up for real awards, if the film did well. People might expect him to continue to take larger roles. He might actually become someone.

Who on earth would think it’s a good idea to give Yuuri Katsuki top billing in anything?

“Well that’s unfortunate that there are so few twenty-something male Asian actors in Hollywood that a no-one like me is the next in line,” Yuuri responded, being self-deprecating like it was the only thing he knew.

“Yuuri,” Celestino sighed, “That is not it at all. They also happen to know that you’re already available—that’s a big factor too,” Celestino joked.

“If I wanted someone to tease me, I could have kept Phichit as my manager,” Yuuri grumbled.

“Seriously though, Yuuri,” Celestino said. “This is a massive deal. Your casting in _The Ice Master_ was already more of a big break than many people get in a lifetime, and here you are getting another.”

“Who—” Yuuri asked slowly, not sure he wanted to know the answer. “Who do they want for Kensey?”

“I don’t have anything firm, but I heard from the person in casting I got any of this information from that they think they might be able to snatch Victor Nikiforov. He’s expressed some late interest in the project.”

Yuuri collapsed backwards on the bed, clutching the phone to his chest.

“Yuuri?” he could hear Celestino muffled yelling through the phone. “Yuuri!”

“I’m—I’m going to have to call you back,” Yuuri murmured as he raised the phone off his chest only to hang up and then promptly threw it across the bed like it was a grenade.

“Morning Yuuri!” Phichit said, popping his head into Yuuri’s room, wearing some sort of rather expensive looking face mask. “Woah there, buddy, what’s happening?” Phichit asked as he assessed the situation (i.e. seeing Yuuri looking like someone had simultaneously kicked every dog on the planet at once. But even worse).

“How would you feel about going back to Japan with me?” Yuuri mumbled, still staring up at the ceiling.

“Sure,” Phichit said, flopping down on the bed next to Yuuri. “Spring break Japan sounds nice. Getting homesick? Need a break from LA already?”

“No, not for spring break. Like forever.”

“What?” Phichit immediately rolled over to look at Yuuri. “Did something happen with the film?”

Yuuri just blinked up at the ceiling and Phichit sighed.

“Come on, Yuuri, there will be other projects. This was literally your first audition since _The Ice Master_ ,” Phichit said. “Come on, talk to me.”

“The leads dropped out. Ji and Leroy.”

Phichit furrowed his brow.

“What does that have to do with you? Do they cancel entire films over something like that? Won’t they just get someone else?”

“They have. Or, at least, they have some people in mind.”

“Alright, well that’s great! Who is it?”

Yuuri rolled over and buried his face into a pillow, mumbling something.

“What? I can’t understand.”

With a deep breath, Yuuri lifted his head up.

“Me and Victor Nikiforov,” he whispered quickly.

Phichit’s jaw dropped and he slapped Yuuri in the shoulder repeatedly.

“Oh. My. God.”

*

“Have you ever met Nikiforov?” Celestino asked over what he called a “working lunch” but Yuuri thought of as a wasted lunch because he never had the appetite to eat anything when they were discussing his career.

He felt even worse today, considering Celestino just confirmed that Victor Nikiforov was officially signed on to play opposite him in the film, which had also in the meantime acquired the title _On Your Love_.

“No,” Yuuri said quickly, hoping Celestino didn’t catch that it was a bit too quickly.

“Well, maybe I’ll call his manager and set up a lunch. Start to work on chemistry and such—particularly since you’re so new to the business. I’ve heard that Nikiforov is a very generous actor, I’m sure he’d be happy to spend a little extra time with you if it would help your performance.”

“Aren’t they going to have us read together?” Yuuri asked.

“Honestly, I think they’re so fed up with the fiasco of things they’re in a bit of a rush. They know Nikiforov will make it work no matter what, and you, despite your fairly limited career have already earned a reputation for being able to act with anyone. Your first ever audition and you walked into a room with Christophe Giacometti and didn’t faint, or punch him, or sleep with him, for Christ sakes—something that happens very, very rarely, apparently.”

“Chris is just a flirt,” Yuuri shrugged. “He’s nice though.”

“So I’ll set up lunch then?”

“Can it be like, coffee instead?” Yuuri asked. “Something a little lower pressure.”

“You want Victor Nikiforov to meet you at Starbucks?” Celestino asked, quirking an eyebrow.

“It doesn’t have to be Starbucks,” Yuuri said meekly. “It can be somewhere pretentious and private. But just—” Yuuri stammered, his voice trailing of helplessly.

“Okay, fine, coffee then,” Celestino chuckled. “Now, do you want me to get your food boxed up?” he asked, eying Yuuri’s untouched sandwich.

Meekly, Yuuri nodded.

*

“So I take it Victor signed?” Phichit asked as Yuuri came back to their apartment and immediately fell face forward on the couch.

“And I did too,” Yuuri muttered into the couch cushion.

“Come on Yuuri, shouldn’t you be excited to get to work with your idol? Meet him on equal ground?” Phichit said rousingly.

Yuuri flopped over onto his back and stared up at the ceiling and made a noise that was a cross between a whine and a groan.

“What?” Phichit asked.

“There’s something I never told you.”

“What?” Phichit repeated, more excitedly this time.

“I’ve met Victor Nikiforov before.”

“What?” Phichit repeated eagerly now, shoving Yuuri’s feet up to sit down on the end of the couch next to him. “When?”

“Last month, when I was flying back to LA. I, em, ran into him at the airport.”

Phichit gasped.

“Yuuri!” Phichit said, swatting at Yuuri’s knee excitedly. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Yuuri didn’t say anything and Phichit furrowed his brow.

“Was he a dick or something?” he asked. “Everyone always says he’s super nice, but those are always the ones that are actually like psychopaths, right? I mean, look at you, you’re the nicest person I’ve ever met and some people when they first meet you think you’re a bit of an asshole because you’re too socially anxious.”

“Gee, thanks,” Yuuri murmured, picking his feet up and laying them across Phichit’s lap.

“You know what I mean,” Phichit said. “So, what happened?”

“He asked me if I wanted a photo with him.”

“What?”

“He asked me if I wanted a photo with him,” Yuuri repeated.

“Where’s the photo?”

“I didn’t take it. I just walked away.”

“You aren’t making a good case for yourself in the people not thinking you’re a dick department.”

Yuuri groaned.

“I didn’t—I didn’t approach him, or anything,” Yuuri said. “He caught me staring at him and then he asked me if I wanted a photo, probably assuming I was a fan. And I mean, I am—or was. But also _The Ice_ _Master_ had just premiered but of course that didn’t change anything and—”

“So you walked away,” Phichit finished. “Man, he really is a dick then, assuming people want photos with him like that.”

“No,” Yuuri sighed. “I mean, I’m sure he’s just trying to cut straight to the punch to save time. He’s Victor Nikiforov after all.”

“That doesn’t mean that—” Phichit said but was cut off as Yuuri’s phone started to ring.

Yuuri looked at the ID. It was a number he didn’t recognize, but Yuuri was admittedly pretty terrible at labeling his contacts and he’d learned that in the line of work he was now in, it was unfortunately pretty important to always answer the phone.

“Hello?” Yuuri answered.

“Yuuri!” a voice Yuuri recognized instantly called out. “How are you doing darling?”

“I’m fine, Chris, how are you?”

“I’m excellent, just excellent,” Chris said passively, and Yuuri’s stomach churned a bit in anticipation of figuring out what exactly it was Chris wanted. “A little birdie told me you’ve received a bit of an upgrade on your latest film project, congratulations.”

“Yeah, I, uh,” Yuuri said. “Yeah. News is already spreading? They said they weren’t putting out the press release until the beginning of next week.”

“Oh, just a source I have close to project, you know,” Chris said vaguely and Yuuri didn’t care to press. Yuuri had learned pretty quickly after moving to LA that people tend to talk (i.e. gossip) around here constantly. “But that brings me to the reason I called—I’m having a little party tonight and I’d like you to come.”

Yuuri didn’t know how those two things were possibly related but knew it best to not try to spend too long trying to imagine what it’s like inside of Chris’s head.

But he did instantly know that Chris’s idea of a little party would probably be the biggest party Yuuri had ever been to.

“Oh, um,” Yuuri said. “I don’t really do parties.”

“ _Party_?” Phichit mouthed at him, excitedly.

“Oh, yes you do, darling. I know you do,” Chris said knowingly. “You’re a star now, Yuuri, you’ve got to learn to party, at least for the first few years. Then you can let the psychosis of stardom eat you alive and stop leaving your house.”

“That was acting, Chris,” Yuuri stated firmly.

“And it’s still such a shame that they cut that scene from the movie,” Chris said with a sigh. “I hope they put it on the DVD as a bonus feature, although no one really watches DVD’s, not anymore, do they? Maybe _someone_ will, though, and they’ll rip it to YouTube and it will go viral.”

“I really hope it doesn’t,” Yuuri muttered.

“But anyway, you’re definitely coming tonight and I’m not taking no for an answer,” Chris announced. “I’ll just bring the party to your place if you don’t come to mine.”

Yuuri wanted to say, _“You wouldn’t,”_ but he knew that wasn’t true.

“I’m beginning to think my agent was right, you area insufferable to work with.”

“Oh, I definitely am,” Chris said with a laugh. “You, Yuuri Katsuki are a saint for putting up with me for 90 days of shooting.”

“They filmed a lot of our scenes ‘together’ entirely separately and just cut them together.”

“But I always fed you lines, darling, if I was around. Most people specifically ask me not to—too distracting they say,” Chris said flippantly. “So are you coming or not? Starts at nine-ish, that’s when staff is arriving anyway, but please for the love of god don’t show up until 10:00 at the earliest. I’ll text you the address,” Chris said.

Just then Phichit started swatting at Yuuri.

“ _What?”_ Yuuri mouthed, “ _Stop it!”_ he whispered, but Phichit just looked at him pointedly.

Yuuri sighed.

“Can I bring someone?”

“A date or your small Thai friend?”

“Phichit,” Yuuri clarified “Would you say yes to one but not the other?” Yuuri asked, furrowing his brow.

Chris only hummed as a response.

“What? I didn’t imagine that you’d be one to care that Phichit is underaged,” Yuuri said.

Chris clicked his tongue.

“No, no, nothing like that—oh course Phichit can come, it’s an old Hollywood past-time, isn’t it, getting children drunk and high?”

“Phichit is, like, 20.”

“Yes, yes, whatever,” Chris said dismissively and Yuuri just sighed. “See you tonight. Oh, and Yuuri?”

“Yeah?”

“Wear something nice.”

*

“What do you mean you can’t go?” Yuuri asked, collapsing onto his bed after Phichit had popped into his room to give the news. “There is no way I’m going alone.”

“I forgot that I have a shoot tomorrow that I need to be on set for at like 5 tomorrow morning,” Phichit groaned. “And I mean, while normally I’d blow that off to go party with Christophe Giacometti, this is technically speaking a school thing and it’s like an automatic fail if I don’t show up—I can’t risk it!”

Yuuri sighed.

“What if we go and only stay for like an hour?” Yuuri bartered weakly. “Be back before midnight.”

“Oh no,” Phichit said. “You’re going to go and have fun, Yuuri. Come on, have a drink and stick with Christophe and I’m sure there is no way you won’t have a good story to tell me tomorrow.”

“If I remember,” Yuuri mumbled.

Phichit sighed.

“Okay, how about this. We’re going to set a _hard_ line at five drinks—that’s the marker for problem drinking right? Doctors always asking you when the last time you had 6 or more drinks is? But five drinks and you’re A-Okay, got it? You can even text me a photo of what you’re drinking if you worry about forgetting how much you’ve had, okay?”

“I feel like when a friend expresses concern for their relationship with alcohol you’re not supposed to barter them into getting hammered anyway,” Yuuri muttered. “You’re being a bad influence.”

Phichit sighed, again, slightly louder this time and sat down on the bed next to Yuuri, pushing aside the mountain of clothes that Yuuri had assembled trying to figure out how to dress himself.

“Look, if you really don’t want to go, and if you really don’t want to drink, I’m not going to make you,” Phichit said. “But I worry that you’re trying to get out of this because you’re afraid of living your life, not because you’re afraid of having your stomach pumped. This isn’t some gross and sleazy frat party, Yuuri. You’re young and rich and famous, you should have fun sometimes.”

“I feel like all of those things only make me more susceptible to alcohol or drug abuse,” Yuuri murmured. “And I do have fun! I like hanging out with you at home.”

Phichit sighed third time, this time exasperatedly.

“You know that’s not—” he tried to argue but floundered. “Fine, go for an hour and come home,” he said. “But could you at least for the love of god smoke some pot or hook up with someone terribly pretty?”

Yuuri just looked at Phichit with his eye brows raised.

“Fine,” he sighed in defeat, picking up a one of the clearly oversized button-downs that was lying on Yuuri’s bed. “At least let me pick out your outfit though, you disaster man.”

“Deal.”

*

Yuuri stepped out of his Uber started to make the trek up to Chris’s house. He pulled nervously on his suit jacket, longing for the comfort of a t-shirt and hoodie. Phichit had taken the business of dressing him up very seriously though, and had Yuuri outfitted in a newly tailored suit that he had yet to wear because ugh, no.

He’d even found and carefully folded Yuuri a pocket square.

And Yuuri knew it was stylish because the pants were a bit too short for no practical reason that Yuuri could gauge and he was wearing no show socks in his dress shoes instead of normal socks, both of which Phichit had reassured him was the style.

Yuuri just thought that his ankles were cold.

Chris’s house was much nicer than Yuuri’s little apartment, though, by a lot. Chris had one of those giant glass houses up in the hills in a gated community that you think of when you think of LA extravagance. And you could tell there was a party going on from the street.

And Yuuri suddenly felt a bit like he was in a movie.

(Or, well, in the final cut of a movie, anyway. Yuuri knew now that actually being in a movie tends to involve a lot of repeat takes that don’t exactly feel very authentic to pretending you’re living someone else’s life.)

Yuuri could hear the music throbbing, see shadows of figures in the windows, and suddenly he wanted nothing more than to run back down to the street and try to catch his car before it left.

But instead he took a breath and texted Chris.

_I’m here, please come greet me or I’m going to stop in the kitchen to raid the fridge and then go lock myself in a closet and stress eat._

Chris wrote back probably fairly quickly in the grand scheme of things, but Yuuri stood there on the steps for what felt like ages.

_Relax darling, I’ll meet you at the door._

Yuuri walked up the few final steps and then stood there, suddenly realizing he had no idea what to do. Was it open, should he just go in? Should he ring the doorbell? Knock? Text Chris again? Had Chris hired a bouncer?

“Darling! What on earth are you standing out here for?” Chris exclaimed as he opened the door.

“I wasn’t sure—” Yuuri stammered as Chris grabbed his arm and pulled him inside.

Chris looked at him sympathetically.

“Okay, pro-tip,” Chris said strategically, wrapping an arm around Yuuri’s shoulder and navigating him through a crowd. Yuuri kept his eyes on the ground, knowing he’d die if he started recognizing people—particularly if he _knew_ those people but had never _met_ them. “Start drinking before the party so you don’t flatline its energy the second you walk in.”

“I did!” Yuuri defended. “I went to school here, I know how to pre-game,” Yuuri muttered as Chris dragged him up to the bar.

And he _had_ started drinking before he’d left for the party. He’d taken shots with Phichit before he’d left.

 _“These don’t count towards the five,”_ Phichit had insisted.

Of course, that turned out to be true, but only because while Yuuri felt slightly lightheaded as he’d walked out of his building to the car, by the time he’d pulled up to Chris’s a forty-five-minute ride across the city later, the only thing his mind was swimming with was anxiety.

“Well, how about something a little stronger then?” Chris asked.

“Stronger then tequila shots?” Yuuri responded helplessly.

“Woah, okay, fine then maybe something lighter—a little easier to get lost in,” Chris suggested with a knowing look. “Oh, I know! A glass of my finest champagne, my good sir!” Chris exclaimed to the bartender.

The bartender pulled a bottle out from under the counter and fiddled with it for a moment before pouring out a flute and pushing it across the counter to Yuuri.

Chris looked at him expectantly.

Yuuri took a slow sip. It was dry but felt tingly and light in his mouth.

“No, no, Yuuri, come on,” Chris encouraged.

Yuuri furrowed his brow and Chris mimed knocking one back.

Yuuri sighed and raised his glass in a toast before downing it in one go.

“Ah, there we go!” Chris said with a laugh, clapping Yuuri on the back. “Another!” he said to the bartender. “And another gin and tonic for me.”

Another moment and another drink was placed in his hand. Yuuri looked at Chris cautiously.

“Oh, don’t look at me like that, you can pace yourself however you want now, I just wanted to make sure you start the evening off right, after all we are celebrating you!” Chris said and Yuuri immediately wanted protest because he _certainly hoped not_ , but then then Chris said something that made Yuuri freeze—

“And Victor of course.”

Yuuri choked on his champagne.

“What?”

Yuuri had thought that Phichit was good at a devilish smile, but in that moment, Yuuri swore Chris transformed into the Cheshire cat, the way he was grinning at him.

“Oh, you know, your new co-star? Have you two not met yet? He’s around here somewhere, I’ll have to make sure to introduce you two!” Chris said, far too casually. “Oh, did I mention you look _sexy_ tonight? Good work.”

Feeling helpless and suddenly more overwhelmed (how was that possible?), Yuuri took a swig of his champagne and gestured to the bartender to start prepping him another glass.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Also, Yuuri's career here is like incredibly loosely modeled after Henry Golding's, like so loosely I probably don't even need to mention it, but also just in case you get as much enjoyment thinking about Henry Golding as I do, here is an opportunity to do so. 
> 
> And if this fic seems like it might be a good time to you, definitely let me know in whatever capacity makes you most comfortable!


	2. A Hard Act to Follow (Or, Yuuri Katsuki, Professional Actor, Learns to Act)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Chris,” Victor whined. “How is Yuuri Katsuki so cool?”

Yuuri woke up the next morning to find that he was in his own bed, in his own room, in his own apartment.

And that he was alone.

All good things.

Of course, Yuuri couldn’t remember how he’d gotten there, and his head was throbbing. Which was less great.

Yuuri rolled over and instantly regretted it as his entire being seemed to throb, but the pain it caused was partially validated by the glass of water and bottle of pain relievers he found sitting on his night stand.

Phichit must have left them for him. He was probably a disaster when he got back last night.

Yuuri let out a groan at the implications of it all and quickly swallowed two pills before sipping on the water, setting himself to remembering what happened last night no matter how much his brain protested.

He definitely remembered getting to Chris’s and Chris greeting him, that bit came easily.

He remembered having a glass of champagne, that was clear too.

And then he remembered Chris saying something—something—

Oh.

Chris had said that Victor was at the party.

And then Yuuri remembered more champagne. Lots and lots more champagne.

_Fuck._

But no! Yuuri couldn’t remember seeing Victor at all. And not like his memory blacked out after that point, but that he specifically remembered a solid chunk of time passing sans Victor Nikiforov.

He didn’t remember having fun, per se, but he remembered growing progressively flirty with the bar tender and wandering around the house, not really talking to anyone and no one really talking to him.

There _was_ a younger blond boy that Yuuri remembered noticing watching him throughout the night.

He’d noticed because the kid was clearly significantly younger than anyone else at the party and looked just as frustrated about being there as Yuuri felt.

But then—but then—

Oh.

He _had_ seen Victor.

He’d been god knows how many glasses of champagne in when he’d stumbled out of the house into the backyard. And then there _he_ was, sitting on a wicker sofa, talking to some woman Yuuri had thought was maybe familiar but that he couldn’t quite place in his current state of mind.

And then Victor had looked up at him.

And Yuuri had immediately turned around and gone back inside, quickly shutting himself in the nearest bathroom.

But there was more—Yuuri could remember more.

Not of Victor though, but that blond boy.

Yuuri had been camped out in Chris’s very nice bathroom when suddenly there had been pounding at the door.

“ _Eh?”_ Yuuri had said, realizing exactly how drunk he was the second he tried to form words. “ _Minute, please, thanks?”_

“ _Open up, idiot!”_ a voice had screamed.

“ _What?”_ Yuuri had asked, but for some reason had gone on to unlock the door anyway.

And then barging in came the blond teenager.

 _“What the fuck is wrong with you?”_ he’d asked.

 _“What?”_ Yuuri had repeated, suddenly feeling the need to sit down.

 _“Hiding out in a fucking bathroom, running away from that other idiot?”_ the teen spat. “ _What the fuck is wrong with you_?”

Yuuri had stumbled over to the fancy jetted tub and sat down on the ledge.

“ _I—”_ Yuuri had stammered. “ _Have you been watching me?”_

The teen had rolled his eyes.

“ _You stick out like a fucking sore thumb_ ,” he said. “ _You don’t belong here.”_

“ _What?”_

 _“You’re an idiot and you don’t belong here,”_ he’d reiterated the position he apparently felt very strongly about.

And then, Yuuri remembered, he had suddenly started crying.

_Oh. Great._

_“What the fuck?”_ the teen had shouted, sounding surprised this time, as Yuuri had sniffed and wiped at his eyes.

But Yuuri, not interested in withstanding anymore abuse from teenagers he didn’t know, mustered all the ability he had left to stand up straight, and got up and stumbled out of the bathroom.

And that’s where things started to get fuzzier.

He vaguely remembered running into Chris. He remembered trying and failing to pretend he hadn’t been crying and Chris talking to him gently and getting him another drink.

And then that was where his memories stopped.

Yuuri groaned again, set down the now empty water glass, and collapsed back in bed.

_What time was it, anyway?_

Yuuri flopped his hand blindly back over to his night stand, remembering seeing his phone next to the pills and the water.

He located it and held it up in front of his face, snuggling further down into his bed.

He clicked on the glaringly bright screen and was greeted by about a dozen messages.

 _Seems like you must have had some fun last night,_ a text from Phichit read, which wasn’t encouraging, considering Yuuri remembered having exactly no fun.

 _Hey Yuuri, so Victor has an opening in his schedule this afternoon. He’s going to meet you for coffee at 2:30, okay? I’ll send you the location_.

Yuuri’s stomach did a flip flop as he read the text. What time—

It was 2:00. It was 2:00 and Yuuri probably felt and looked like death. And he had to meet Victor Nikiforov.

Yuuri quickly looked up the coffee shop Celestino had sent him a link too and discovered it was just in Silver Lake. Thank god, he could get there in probably 15 minutes.

Yuuri quickly requested a car to come pick him up and jumped out of bed.

Then he immediately sat back down as a jolt of pain and a wave of nausea swept through him.

Okay. Fine.

He was going to go meet Victor Nikiforov. His co-star. In a film. That millions of people would see.

And he was going to do it very obviously hungover.

He might as well just try to accept it.

Yuuri reached for the bottle on his night stand and popped a third pill.

*

Yuuri walked into the coffee shop knowing he looked like a disaster.

His hair wouldn’t lie flat no matter how many times he’d tried to comb it, so now it was slicked back with a gross feeling amount of hair gel. He’d traded his usual glasses for the prescription sunglasses that Phichit had insisted he invest in after they moved to LA, but of course had forgotten his normal glasses at home in the process—so now he had to make the decision to either be the asshole who wears sunglasses inside or be nearly blind. He was wearing basically the first clothes that he’d found, which was basically just a white t-shirt, jeans, and a pair of Vans, plus a jacket that he’d grabbed without thinking much on the way out of the house which turned out to be Phichit’s and leather and a bit too small for him and made him feel like a stuffed pig.

And to top it all off, he was five minutes late.

He looked around the café, trying to locate Victor. Hopefully the man was also late. Maybe he’d decided to stand Yuuri up.

That would be excellent.

His phone buzzed. A text from an un-labeled number came in.

_I’m in the corner, to your left :)_

What? Yuuri furrowed his brow but looked to the back corner of the restaurant to his left to find a man sitting at the table there. Yuuri approached cautiously, but as he got closer, it became apparent that under the baseball cap and a pair of tortoise shell glasses it was Victor Nikiforov.

And _ugh_ , had Celestino passed Yuuri’s number on to Victor?

“Hey,” Yuuri mustered up the courage to say as he approached the table.

“Hi Yuuri!” Victor immediately announced way too enthusiastically for Yuuri’s hungover brain to process. Victor must have noticed Yuuri wince though, because his smile faltered.

“Did you order something yet?” Yuuri asked, frowning as he noticed Victor was sitting at an empty table. Had Victor managed to order and finish a drink in the time he’d been waiting? No, he couldn’t have in five minutes, right? Had he been early? Was Yuuri actually later than he’d thought?

 _Ugh_ , he was a terrible person.

“Oh, no,” Victor said, looking surprised. “I haven’t. I was waiting for you.”

 _Oh, right_ , Victor was hiding in a corner with a disguise, he probably didn’t want to risk being recognized by the barista, Yuuri put together. It was taking Yuuri time to figure out how celebrities ran their lives, but he was learning how to pick up on those kinds of things quicker, at least. It was probably Yuuri’s job though, as the significantly less famous of the two of them to get their order, as was inevitably some unspoken Hollywood rule.

“What do you want? I’ll get it for you,” Yuuri offered.

Victor was still looking at him with wide-eyes and Yuuri began to worry he was somehow making a faux-pas, even though he was trying so hard not to.

“Oh!” Victor said. “Just a latte is fine, I could—” Victor continued but Yuuri cut him off.

“Don’t worry about it,” Yuuri said. “I’ll be right back.”

Yuuri went up to the counter and ordered a latte for Victor and some tea for himself. Then he also ordered a muffin, on the off chance that he’d suddenly feel less like death after eating a carb.

Yuuri picked up the order a few minutes later and made his way back to the table—it suddenly occurring to him that he hadn’t thought to ask Victor if he wanted something to eat.

“Sorry,” Yuuri immediately apologized as he set the drinks and the muffin down on the table. “I don’t know how you’re feeling this afternoon, but I’m a little, well—” Yuuri made a face. “I’m hoping some food will help. We can split it if you want,” Yuuri offered helplessly.

Unless Victor didn’t eat muffins. Maybe he was vegan. Or gluten free. Or keto. Or didn’t eat processed sugar. Or—

“Is it chocolate chip?” Victor asked.

Oh god, chocolate chip muffins were ridiculous, weren’t they? Basically dessert, not even really trying to be breakfast. He should have gone with the lemon poppy seed. He should have just gotten a banana.

He should have stayed in bed.

“Yeah,” Yuuri confirmed.

“That sounds delicious,” Victor said with a smile, and Yuuri, despite himself, found himself smiling back.

“Let me go grab a knife, then,” Yuuri murmured.

Yuuri returned with a plastic knife a moment later and carefully cut the muffin in half, shoving Victor’s half across the plate towards him.

“So, what did you order?” Victor asked.

“Hm?” Yuuri said, looking down at the muffin and feeling confused.

“To drink?”

“Oh, it’s just green tea,” Yuuri said, now feeling like a moron.

“You don’t drink coffee?”

“Not really, makes me a little crazy,” Yuuri responded.

Victor nodded.

“Do you put anything in it?”

“Um, depends,” Yuuri said. “On the quality, I guess. If they didn’t brew it right, then sometimes I’ll put in some honey or something to cover up the bitterness.”

Was Yuuri really such a hopeless conversationalist that Victor was resorting to interrogating him about his drink order?

“And how is this tea?” Victor followed up.

“It’s fine,” Yuuri said. “They advertise the brand, that’s usually a decent sign,” Yuuri shrugged. “It’s not my favorite though.”

“Oh?” Victor said. “What is your favorite?”

“Well, I mean, my favorite I guess is technically the kind my mom makes in Japan. Although it’s not really fancy, or anything, just comes from the shop down the street from our house. It’s more of a nostalgia thing, I guess,” Yuuri said. “But if you go to a tea shop or sometimes Asian grocery stores, you can find some good loose-leaf tea.”

“So you grew up in Japan?” Victor asked.

Yuuri took a sip of his tea and nodded.

“I came to the US for school,” Yuuri said.

“Why?” Victor asked.

“Oh, um,” Yuuri said, “My English teacher in school said I was really good with the language and recommended I consider going to school abroad.”

Of course, that was the abridged version. The truth was that the thought of having to take the university entrance exam was causing him anxiety so severe that he was about ready to write off going to university all together rather than continue to suffer through worrying about it.

Then his English teacher had mentioned that if he went to school abroad, he might not even have to take the entrance exam, and if he did take it, his score would be only one small factor of a more holistic admissions process.

And in the end, while he had taken the entrance exam and done fine, the idea of going abroad for school had taken hold in him, and the idea of remaking the choice as to whether to go to school in the US or Japan made him nearly as anxious as the damn entrance exam had.

So off to Michigan he eventually went.

“Oh, that’s so interesting,” Victor said. “Your English is very good. Very little accent, that must be helpful in getting work. I’ve lived here for more than a decade now and I still had to work with a dialect coach for months upon months in my teens to be able to speak without it and actually land a decent gig.”

“You were born in Russia, right?” Yuuri asked, even though of course he knew the answer.

“Oh, yes, St. Petersburg,” Victor said. “I was scouted for modelling back in Russia as a child, but what I really wanted to be was an actor—I’d done some local theater when I was a child. Unfortunately, Russia’s film industry still isn’t particularly thriving, although it’s just finally starting to pick up again now, so I used the modeling as a stepping stone to leave.”

Yuuri nodded politely hoping that Victor would be one of those kinds of people that would happily carry a conversation by himself.

Victor easily confirmed Yuuri’s suspicions.  

“But then, when I finally made it to the US for some shoots for international campaigns, I realized there wasn’t exactly a ton of acting roles for scrawny Russian teenagers who just barely spoke English. I did manage to get a couple roles playing like the children of Russian bad guys on American crime shows, but it wasn’t going to be enough work to keep me in the US for long. That’s when I started working on my accent and eventually got cast in _The Lilac Fairy_. But look at me babbling,” Victor said, ducking his head in a kind of modest way that was strange to see out of the man Yuuri had always imagined as a bit larger than life.

“I’m glad that you speak with it when not acting,” Yuuri said, not really thinking about it, just trying to fill in the gap in the conversation. “Your accent, I mean. For a while you started talking like an American all the time, I remember.”

It occurred to Yuuri what he’d said though when he noticed the surprise on Victor’s face.

“Oh, you noticed that?” Victor asked, looking a little _embarrassed_ (?). “There was a director on a project that I worked with in my early twenties who tried to convince me that it would be detrimental to my career to draw attention to my Russian-ness. He said it would be confusing and upsetting for people. So for a while I tried speaking with an American accent all the time. Thankfully though Yakov knocked some sense back into me when he became my manager. British actors act with American accents but obviously still speak with British accents outside of their roles, for example. I know it’s different, that there is this idea that speaking English with an American or British accent is better English than speaking with a non-English dialect accent. But I just don’t feel like myself without it. Which is fine for acting, but less fine for being a real person.”

“Well I’m glad,” Yuuri said with a smile that felt surprisingly genuine, and which to his horror, Victor returned. “If anything you should try and use it more, if there is ever a character you can get away with it,” Yuuri said and then paused, realizing he probably sounded incredibly rude, telling Victor Nikiforov how he should talk. “I mean, I just don’t think you have to make sense to anyone.”

“Clearly you haven’t gone through a media training then yet,” Victor laughed, but his accent suddenly seemed a bit thicker.

“I haven’t received training in much of anything,” Yuuri said softly. “I’m kind of just learning as I go. I bet I’m doing everything wrong.”

“Clearly you aren’t doing everything wrong,” Victor said gently. “But you have a mentor in me.”

“What?” Yuuri asked.

“I’ll help you,” Victor said. “If that is still something you’d like.”

“I—” Yuuri found himself stammering, not sure what to make of the offer, but the part of him that thought little of himself sure it must somehow be an insult. “That is a gracious offer, but I don’t want to be a burden to you. You should focus on your own performance.”

“But that is exactly it, Yuuri,” Victor said. “We should focus on our performance, _together_.”

Yuuri was just starting to think how it was definitely an insult, that Victor just thought he was incompetent as an actor and would need all the help he found get, when Victor reached out and placed a hand on Yuuri’s forearm.

And suddenly Yuuri couldn’t think about anything else.

“You know this role could be very big for both of us, surely. The writers, the director, the timing, the budget, everything is in place for this film to go on to do very well this awards season. It just needs us.”

“Oh,” Yuuri gasped. What Victor was trying to say was, perhaps, _we have every reason to succeed_ , but all Yuuri heard was, _it_ _will_ _be_ _your_ _fault_ _if_ _we_ _fail_. “I mean. Yes, right. Fine.”

“Fine?”

“I mean, thank you for meeting up with me, I’m sure you’re very busy,” Yuuri said, pulling his arm away from Victor and standing up from the table. “I look forward to working with you on this project. I’m sure there is a lot I’ll be able to learn from you.”

“Oh, I’m sorry, do you have another meeting after this one? I was thoughtless to not ask if you were under a time constraint,” Victor said, standing up from the table as well.

“Oh, um, no, I just—” Yuuri murmured, for some reason not using the excuse Victor was handing to him. “I’ll see you in a couple weeks, right? They’ve been powering through pre-production and we’ll have a read-through soon?”

Victor looked at Yuuri with his brow knit, but quickly enough he arranged his face into a smile.

“Yes, yes, we’ll see each other again very soon.”

“Thanks for meeting with me,” Yuuri smiled back.

“Thank you for the coffee,” Victor said. “I owe you one.”

“No, no, it’s fine, my pleasure,” Yuuri countered, but Victor just smiled at him and said nothing and Yuuri stared back awkwardly.

“Right, well, see ya,” Yuuri shrugged before spinning on his heel and trying not to look like he was fleeing.

*

“Chris,” Victor whined. “How is Yuuri Katsuki so cool?”

Chris sputtered on his drink.

“What?”

Victor had apparently gone to meet up with his aforementioned co-star for coffee this morning, and less than an hour after Victor had texted him gushing with excitement, the man had followed up insisting that they go out and find a drink a little stronger.

And so Chris had imagined at best, Victor now after meeting sober Yuuri, in all his trademark awkward evasive terror, was left with more questions than answers and now wanted to interrogate Chris, as someone who knew Yuuri fairly well.

He hadn’t expected Victor to come sulking into the bar like a puppy with its tail between its legs.

“I just—how do I get him to like me?” Victor asked, collapsing forward onto the bar in a slump.

“Are you under the impression he doesn’t?”

“Chris,” Victor said, suddenly sitting back up and looking at Chris with great earnestness. “You should have seen him, Chris. You know how when you usually meet someone else in the industry for the first time, not at like an award ceremony or on set but in like normal life, they usually kind of look a bit shit and are just horrifically disappointing?”

“Sure,” Chris said, looking at Victor skeptically.

“Well, Yuuri Katsuki walked into that coffee shop like he owned the place. And me. Did he buy up my contract when I wasn’t looking, Chris?”

“I’m not sure I understand.”

“He insisted on buying my latte before I could even recover from looking at him, and then he _split his muffin with me_ ,” Victor said like it was a secret.

“Is that a euphemism?”

“No!” Victor exclaimed, sounding exasperated. “But who does that?”

“Split muffins?”

“Yes!”

“Victor, I’m really confused.”

“It’s just, everything I expected of him, he did the opposite.”

“So you expected him not to split his muffin with you?” Chris asked. “Yuuri can be a little rude sometimes, but only because he’s kind of anxious and shy.”

“See, Chris, you keep telling me things like that—‘Yuuri is so anxious and shy, be gentle with him,’ ‘Yuuri is sometimes a little awkward in person, but he pulls himself together once the camera is rolling,’ ‘Yuuri is quiet, don’t be insulted if he seems withdrawn.’ But I don’t see any of that in him!”

“Huh,” Chris said thoughtfully. “Well, good for him then. I’m glad he found a bit of grit before the media has really had a chance to take a shot at him.”

“What?” Victor said, it now his turn to be confused.

“Never mind,” Chris said. “Just, keep being yourself Victor, and I’m sure Yuuri will warm up to you just fine.”

“I don’t want him to warm up to me—he’s already too nice and cool and intimidating. I want him to _like_ me.”

Chris laughed.

“Good luck with that, from my understanding and personal experience, Yuuri does not put out. Pretty sure he might even be a virgin.”

The look of horror on Victor’s face was priceless.

“What!” he squawked. “No, I didn’t mean. I mean—he’s stunning—but no. I meant, more like as friends. Partners maybe. But not like—boyfriend partners! Unless he wanted that. No, I mean—like acting partners. Like Ben Affleck and Matt Damon. Amy Poehler and Tina Fey. Not like—no, he’s too good for me. And he probably only sleeps with like, I don’t know. Models, maybe. Or like billionaire business men. Foreign diplomats. Maybe even, like, secret agents.”

“Secret agents?”

“Yeah, people as cool as he is.”

“Right,” Chris said with a laugh, shaking his head in disbelief. “God, I can’t wait to watch the production of this film.”

“Oh, well, with Yuuri in it, I’m sure this film is going to be very good.”

“No, I don’t mean the final product. I mean the making it part. And probably the press tour. It’s going to be a blast,” Chris laughed.

“What do you mean?”

Chris only shook his head and took a sip of his drink, saying nothing.

Victor sighed.

“He said he liked my accent, Chris,” Victor murmured, twirling his own drink around his glass. “Do you think I should text him? Or no, call him them, right?”

“Text him,” Chris said, definitively, shaking his head yet again while an amused grin tugged at his lips. Oh, this was going to be so much fun. “Definitely text him.”

*

Yuuri was in a bookstore that afternoon when it happened for the first time.

After leaving the coffeeshop and Victor, Yuuri, who hadn’t called a car to pick him up, had decided to just walk home.

But then he started stewing about how he was an embarrassment to the profession of acting, and that of course Victor Nikiforov felt he’d need to help Yuuri out. The man probably just wanted to make sure the movie didn’t bomb.

And then he passed a little bookshop, and decided the he, Yuuri Katsuki, professional actor, was going to learn how to act.

So he went in and found that, not entirely unexpectedly, there was an entire section on acting and drama. With some googling, he easily found a list of “Books Every Actor Should Read” and found four of the six recommended easily on the shelves. And then he picked up a copy of _Breaking into Acting for Dummies_. Just for good measure.

But then, as he stood in front of the cash register with his arms full of what was probably required reading for Acting 101, waiting for the cashier to notice he was ready to check out, it happened.

The cashier finally looked up from the pile of books he was scanning, and as he caught sight of Yuuri, he said it—

“Hey, are you Yuuri Katsuki?”

He said it wrong, pronouncing way too many U’s, just across the board, but Yuuri had no intention of correcting him.

“Uh,” Yuuri said. He could lie, probably, say no. The cashier would probably believe him. It would be so easy to— “Yeah,” Yuuri said. “I am.”

“I knew it, I just saw your picture in the news this morning, you’re going to be in Victor Nikiforov’s new movie!”

Oh, right, _Victor Nikiforov’s new movie_. Because even if they had equal billing, Yuuri was in a way going to still be a supporting role in comparison.

Yuuri didn’t know if that was comforting or infuriating.

“Oh,” Yuuri said. “They made the announcement this morning then?”

Celestino had told him on Saturday that they’d be making the announcement sometime early next week. He’d assumed that meant like sometime Monday or Tuesday. Maybe even Wednesday.

Not Sunday morning.

The cashier didn’t seem to know how to respond to this in retrospect fairly pointless question though, and Yuuri kicked himself for being so helpless.

“So,” the cashier said instead. “With you,” the man paused and looked Yuuri up and down in a way that made Yuuri want to burrow into the ground, “And Victor, is it going to be like _Stay Close to Me_?”

“What?” Yuuri asked.

“They didn’t say much about the plot, just that it has two male leads.”

 _What?_ Yuuri thought again. And what did that have to do with _Stay Close to Me_? And then, _Oh._

“Oh, no, it’s uh, about friendship. And it’s uh, like a detective film?” Was he even allowed to talk about this? If he kept talking and then this guy went to the press, could Yuuri be fired for breaching his contract? “I think it’s supposed to be kind of subversive, taking a kind of genre that can be hypermasculine and then focusing instead on models of like non-toxic masculinity through, uh, male friendship,” Yuuri rambled, trying to regurgitate a conglomeration of all the ways Celestino and casting directors and other miscellaneous people involved had described the film to him.

“Hm,” the man said. “Well that’s disappointing.”

“Hm?” Yuuri basically hiccupped, the sound more of a startled reflex than intentional.

“Well, I just keep hoping Victor will play a gay character again. And I know, it was risky, or that’s what they seem to say anyway,” the cashier said, sounding a bit bitter, “To play a gay man and then come out like he did and all around _Stay Close to Me_ , so kind of laying low and sliding back into his old roles makes sense but—”

“No, I get it,” Yuuri said, understanding now. “I like all his films, but Victor was always my favorite in _The Lilac Fairy_ and _Stay Close to Me._ But I think that’s more because they were important to me, or us, I guess, for other reasons,” Yuuri said with a shrug.

The cashier looked at him with wide eyes.

“Oh,” he said, and Yuuri wondered if he had said something he shouldn’t have.

“Trust me, if I had to play opposite of Victor Nikiforov romantically, they never would have been able to get me to sign the contract,” Yuuri said, maybe trying to make a joke but mostly just panicking and floundering. “That would probably kill me. Working with him on this project is already maybe too much for me to handle. He’s a bit—well, surely you know,” Yuuri said, scratching the back of his neck and wondering just when he became such a nervous talker.

“Oh,” was all the cashier said again. And then, “Yes, I believe I do.”

“Well, uh,” Yuuri said, holding out the pile of books in his arms, remembering why he’d fallen into this conversation to begin with.

Then he remembered exactly what books he was holding.

“Wait!” Yuuri practically shouted as the cashier took the pile out of his hands.

“What?” the cashier said, looking up, startled.

Then he looked down at the first title on the top of the pile, which happened to of course be _How to Break into Acting for Dummies_.

Then, either in an act of great cruelty or great mercy, Yuuri couldn’t tell yet, the cashier smiled.

“I’m not quite sure you really need this, do you?” he laughed, holding up the book.

“I, uh,” Yuuri stammered, “Just wanted to see what I’ve missed. I’m uh, new to this, you know.”

The cashier hummed and made his way through the pile, scanning each book.

“I mean, lots of people train for this—I mean, as actors. Go to school and stuff you know. And I just, uh, don’t want to embarrass myself,” Yuuri continued.

“Hey, no judgement here, man,” the cashier laughed again. “I actually think that’s really cool,” he said. “Can I maybe interest you in a tote bag though? They cost five bucks, but are, you know a bit less see through than the plastic.”

“Right,” Yuuri said. “That would actually be great.”

“No problem,” the man said. “That will be $67.42. Hey, you were in another movie recently, right?”

Yuuri nodded as he dug through his wallet and handed the man a few twenties.

“ _The Ice Masters_ with Christophe Giacometti.”

The man looked at Yuuri with furrowed brows and then recognition shot through his eyes.

“Oh, I saw that, you were that hot hacker guy! I remember you now.”

“I, uh,” Yuuri stammered.

“Do you know if it’s gone to streaming yet? I’d love to watch it again.”

“Oh, uh, I don’t know. But I bet you can find it online somewhere, if you really look,” Yuuri shrugged.

At this the man laughed again, but Yuuri didn’t know what was funny.

“Right,” he said shaking his head, “Of course. Here’s your books,” he said, handing out the tote bag, “And your change.”

“Keep it,” Yuuri said, taking the tote bag.

“Really? It’s like, $12!”

“Don’t worry about it.” Yuuri insisted.

“Well, take the receipt at least.”

“Oh, no, I’m fine,” Yuuri said, looping the tote bag over his arm.

“Really, you should have your receipt. In case there is something you want to return,” the man said, a slight lilt to his voice.

“Okay, fine, sure,” Yuuri said, grabbing the receipt.

“I know it’s a long shot,” the man said, and Yuuri for a moment was confused until he noticed the phone number scrawled on the receipt in bright blue pen. “But if you ever want to chat again or just have a good time, I’d be more than down of it.”

“Oh,” Yuuri gasped. “I, uh, thanks,” he stammered. “Well I’ll, uh, see you,” Yuuri said as he dropped the receipt into the bag and made a break for the exit.

“Anytime,” the cashier called, and Yuuri, for the second time that day, fled.

*

Phichit got home from an absurdly long and tiring day doing hair and makeup for a student film to find Yuuri sitting on the couch, surrounded by books, the second _Lilac Fairy_ movie playing on the television.

“A Victor Nikiforov marathon, a bunch of books on… acting?” Phichit observed aloud, “And a, what’s this?” Phichit picked up a scrap of paper that was lying on top of one of the books, “A phone number! Yuuri Katsuki, I was excited enough to know what happened last night, but it looks like you’ve had quite an interesting day as well!”

Yuuri pulled the blanket that had been wrapped around his shoulders up over his head.

“Oh,” Phichit laughed sympathetically, leaning down over the back of the couch and rubbing Yuuri’s arms while he rested his head on top of Yuuri’s.

“Tell Mama Phichit all about it.”

Yuuri made a sound like a dying animal and Phichit with a sigh vaulted himself over the back of the couch so he was now crouched beside Yuuri on the couch cushion.

“Look, Yuuri, it’s your favorite part! Andrew is doing magic for Rory and Des!” Phichit explained, his tone perhaps not dissimilar to the way one might talk to a small child. “Come on, you’re missing the mild homoerotic tension between Andrew and Des,” he encouraged, pulling at Yuuri’s blanket until Yuuri’s face popped out.

 _The Lilac Fairy_ movies, based on a young adult book series, were deeply beloved by Yuuri and many. They were also Victor Nikiforov’s breakout role.

(Yuuri always insisted though that he had liked the books _before_ the movies came out.)

They functioned as a sort of modern retelling of _Sleeping Beauty,_ in which Princess Aurora ends up sleeping for much, much longer than the projected 100 years when Prince Désiré never comes for her and instead wakes up in an entirely different millennium. In the books and movies, there was a love triangle between Princess Aurora, Prince Désiré IV, and the great grandson of the Lilac Fairy, the Fairy Prince Andrew, that simmered away while they worked together to stop the plot of Mal, the great grand-daughter of the evil fairy, Carabosse.

But of course, there were many, Yuuri included, although he often didn’t admit it out loud to anyone except Phichit, and even only just, who thought that Rory should be the one cut out of the triangle (or perhaps fall in love with Mal, depending on who you asked) and for Des and Andrew to live happily ever after. That’s not the way it ended up in the books, of course, but Victor Nikiforov’s stunningly androgynous presentation of Andrew in the film only poured fuel on the fire. And for Yuuri, started a decade long crush.

“Hey, do you think you could ask Victor if he was a little on purpose trying to play up the chemistry between him and Des?” Phichit asked, as on-screen Des looked at Andrew with wide eyes as Andrew handed both him and Rory flowers that he’d conjured up.

At this comment though, Yuuri made another dying animal sound and pulled the blanket back down over his face.

“Woah, okay,” Phichit said, reaching forward to grab the remote off the coffee table and pause the movie. “You’re gotta tell me what’s up.”

Just then though, Yuuri’s phone buzzed from where it was on the coffee table. Without thinking about it, Phichit reached forward to grab it and hand to Yuuri.

But then he caught sight of the text that was on the screen.

_Thanks for the coffee today! I’m looking forward to getting to know you better!_

Phichit read the texts aloud to Yuuri, who showed no signed of coming out from under the blanket to read them himself.

The number was, frustratingly, not labeled, so Phichit couldn’t tell who they were from, but if the whimpering sound Yuuri made was any sign, Yuuri at least seemed to know.

“Wait, did you go on a date?” Phichit asked excitedly.

That finally seemed to be enough to inspire Yuuri to tear to blanket off of himself.

“No!” he said, sounding scandalized.

“Then who wants to get to know you better?”

Yuuri stared down into his lap.

“Come on Yuuri, talk to me,” Phichit tried again.

“Victor,” he said meekly. “We went to get coffee this morning,” he said with a sigh. “And it was a disaster, Phichit. I was so hungover, and I looked like trash and I ordered a chocolate chip muffin like some kind of pig and was late and—” Yuuri stammered.

“Woah, woah, woah, Yuuri, slow down. I’m sure it wasn’t that bad.”

“He doesn’t think I’m going to be any good in the movie,” Yuuri said.

“Where did you get that idea?”

“He offered to mentor me,” Yuuri said. “Which I think is code for, _the only way you’re going to pull this off is if I tell you exactly how to act each scene_.”

Phichit looked back down at the phone as it vibrated in his hand with another text from who Yuuri now knew to be none other than Victor Nikiforov. A _Can’t wait to see you again!_ followed by a string of heart emoji’s added to the notifications on the screen.

“Are you sure that’s what he meant?” Phichit asked, now dubious.

“I don’t know,” Yuuri groaned. “But probably. And then I went to go buy some books to learn how to act and the cashier recognized me and saw that I was buying a bunch of books on acting, so now he knows I’m a fraud, and everything is just terrible.”

“Oh!” Phichit said, leaning forward to snap up the receipt with the phone number on it. “Did he give you his number, then?”

“Yeah,” Yuuri sighed. “Except I gave him a really big tip, so I feel a little like a john now.”

“Are you planning on sleeping with him? Or even just texting him?” Phichit modified, knowing Yuuri better despite his choice of simile.

Yuuri’s eyes widened in horror, expressing an obvious and resounding _no_.

“Was he not cute?” Phichit asked. “Or, no, you’re finally this close,” Phichit said, pinching his fingers together, “To bagging the silver stallion.”

“What?” Yuuri asked, sounding lost.

“Victor,” Phichit said with a sigh. “You know, Nikiforov? Your co-star who you’ve been in love with forever, who if these texts are anything to go by may just about return the feelings,” Phichit said, pointing to the screen where the face of a young Victor Nikiforov was frozen. “With the pretty silver hair?” he teased.

Yuuri, however, suddenly bristled.

“Phichit, could you just not today? Victor is just taking pity on a clueless newcomer, trying to save his movie.”

“It’s both of your movie,” Phichit said after a long pause, gently this time.

For another long moment, Yuuri didn’t say anything.

“You want to just order some delivery and finish watching the movie with me?” Yuuri asked quietly.

Phichit sighed and opened up the GrubHub app on Yuuri’s phone, before curling himself up beside his friend, laying his head against Yuuri’s shoulder.

“Throw in some platonic male cuddling, and you’ve got yourself a deal.”

“I think tacos could be nice,” Yuuri said passively, but shifted so he could wrap his blanket around Phichit as well, and then took a hold of Phichit’s free hand, pulling it from where it was sandwiched between them, and gripping onto it tightly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for kudos and comments, feel free to leave more!


	3. Think on Your Feet (Or, Victor Nikiforov Thinks Everything is Yuuri's Fault, Yuuri Agrees)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “So,” Sara said, looking at Yuuri. “What did you do to Victor?”
> 
> Yuuri blinked across the table.
> 
> “I—I didn’t do anything,” he stammered.

Yuuri and Phichit were lying on the floor together, head to foot.

They were in the middle of rehearsing a scene, Phichit filling in for Victor.

Yuuri had been rehearsing every moment for the past week since he got his copy of the final script. He not only knew his lines, but most of everyone else’s at this point. And he’d practiced about five different ways to read every scene, ready to give the director options if something wasn’t working. He’d read the intense pair scenes with Phichit so many times that his roommate could be an understudy himself if this were a play instead of a movie.

But this scene Yuuri couldn’t get right.

And he knew that if he couldn’t get it right acting with Phichit, his best friend and one of the people despite occasional betrayals he trusted more than most people in the world, there was no way he’d be able to get through this scene with Victor.

And maybe it would be fine, one botched scene in an otherwise great movie would probably be excusable. It wouldn’t ruin the film entirely.

Except, it was the last scene of the movie—the last thing that the audience would see, and if done correctly, what they would most remember.

“ _Cal_ ,” Yuuri said, staring up at the ceiling, “ _I’m not sure I want to do this anymore_.”’

There was a long pause. Yuuri had told Phichit to read it like that—but of course Yuuri had no idea how Victor would read it.

“ _Okay,”_ Phichit said. “ _I understand. There are other things to do in the world besides this. I’m sure any of those things would be happy to have you_.”

“ _But—”_ Yuuri said. “ _What if—what if I don’t want anything, anymore?”_

“ _Nothing?”_ Phichit asked. “ _What—what about me?”_

Yuuri sat up.

“ _That’s not what I—”_ Yuuri stammered. “ _You don’t need me. We should end this_.”

“ _Fine, but that’s not the leap you’re making_ ,” Phichit said, quietly.

Yuuri lay back down.

“ _I didn’t mean it like that_.”

“ _Yes you did_ ,” Phichit said. “ _I know you, Neil_.”

“ _Cal_ ,” Yuuri said.

“ _No, wait, I know!_ ”

Phichit turned on “You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)” by Sylvester.

“ _What does this have to do with anything?”_ Yuuri asked.

“ _What doesn’t it?”_ Phichit returned, standing up and holding a hand out to Yuuri.

Yuuri took the offered hand.

“ _Come on,”_ Phichit said, slowly starting to sway his hips.

This was the part Yuuri couldn’t figure out. Yuuri was a classically trained dancer, but he for the life of him couldn’t figure out how he was supposed to move his body in this scene. And Phichit tried, but his movements weren’t quite right either.

But still, they tried to dance, growing more joyous with the passing second. That felt like how it was supposed to go.

“Maybe you should just kiss him,” Phichit said. “This movie is going to get slammed for queerbaiting anyway.”

“No, it’s supposed to show men behaving outside of gender roles outside of a sexual context. There aren’t any love interests in this movie,” Yuuri explained, sighing as the song ended.

“How about this?” Phichit said, suddenly grabbing Yuuri by the shoulders and standing up on his toes as he pressed a kiss to Yuuri’s forehead.

Yuuri’s brow furrowed.

“Yeah, cause I’m just going to be able to suggest that Victor should kiss me,” Yuuri said, collapsing onto the couch.

Phichit shrugged.

“It’s worth a shot,” Phichit smiled wryly as he plopped down beside Yuuri. “Now can we order dinner or are you going to make us take it from the top one more time?”

Yuuri sighed.

“Get me a salad,” he said. “Just because they’ve decided that I don’t need build my upper body into a triangle and reduce my body fat percentage to 4% for this movie doesn’t mean I can slowly evolve into a potato over the process of filming.”

Phichit rolled his eyes but didn’t bother to argue.

*

“Yuuri, what are you doing?” Phichit asked as he peeked into Yuuri’s room.

Yuuri was lying on his bed, a towel wrapped around his waist—clearly recently(-ish) out of the shower—showing no signs of further movement or life for that matter.

And Phichit knew it was bad, because typically if Phichit caught Yuuri in any state of undress, Yuuri would immediately dive under the nearest piece of fabric or furniture or door to keep his bare skin hidden. You’d think growing up at a hot spring that mandated nudity, Yuuri would be slightly less modest, but whenever Phichit had brought that up, Yuuri would only say things like, “ _that’s different,_ ” and “ _it’s tradition_ ,” and “ _everyone keeps their eyes to themselves there, something that you don’t ever bother to do, you perv.”_

But here Phichit was, witnessing Yuuri nearly nude, and the other man barely even so much as blinked.

“Yuuri,” Phichit tried again, his voice gentle, as he walked slowly over to the bed to sit down beside Yuuri. “Don’t you have to be to the studio soon? It’s your first day.”

Yuuri didn’t say anything and Phichit sighed.

“Okay, Yuuri, if you don’t show some sign of life in five seconds, I’m going to undo your towel, snap some pics, and sell your nudes at the peak of your fame for hundreds of thousands of dollars.”

Yuuri, evidently calling Phichit’s bluff, still remain motionless.

Phichit let out a huff of air.

“Okay, fine,” he said. “I’m not going to do that. But I will—” Phichit paused to think. “Oh, I got it! I’ll tickle you!”

At that, Yuuri ever so slowly turned his head to the side to look at Phichit, still saying nothing, but at the very least raising his eyebrows skeptically.

“I’ll do it! Here—here comes the tickle monster!” Phichit said, raising his hands as Yuuri’s expression grew even more dubious. “All you have to do is say something!”

Yuuri did not say anything, and Phichit dropped his hands.

“Okay, fine,” he said. “I’m not going to tickle you. But you’re going to have to become responsive again and move on with your day at some point. Probably pretty soon.”

Yuuri just continued to lay there.

“Oh, wait! I have an idea,” Phichit said, standing up and going to grab Yuuri’s phone off the night stand. He entered the pass code and went into the text messages and quickly he found the right contact.

The first thing he did was label it, because god, how did Yuuri ever find anyone in his messages when basically the only contacts he had labeled in the dozens of different messages he had were Phichit, his sister, and Celestino.

After the contact was labeled as “Victor (ﾉ´ з `)ノ,” Phichit sent a text. It wasn’t anything too inflammatory, just a simple, _Looking forward to working with you today!_

But, the amount of time that he’d been typing away at Yuuri’s phone now was conspicuous enough that Yuuri finally murmured, “What are you doing?”

Phichit looked up from the phone, smiling victoriously.

“Oh, nothing much really. Just sending Victor Nikiforov a text.”

At that, Yuuri sat bolt upright.

_Success._

“What?”

“Yeah, you know, to let him know how excited you are to work with him today!”

“You didn’t,” Yuuri whispered, looking pale, but Phichit didn’t feel the slightest bit bad.

“Yeah,” Phichit said. “I did. And oh look,” Phichit announced as the phone vibrated in his hands, “He responded! He says, _Me too! See you soon_!” Phichit read aloud. “And oh, there are a bunch of emojis. Wow. He really likes emojis.”

Yuuri was now up and on his feet, trying to grab the phone out of Phichit’s hand.

“No!” he protested. “You didn’t! Don’t kid with me!”

“I’m not kidding!” Phichit said, dodging Yuuri as he attempted to grab the phone out of his hands. “Now, how should I respond?” Phichit mused, leaping away as Yuuri took another pass at him. “Do you think if I told him you just took a shower, I could bait him into responding, _Without me?_ ”

“Don’t you dare, stop messing around!”

Phichit hopped up on Yuuri’s bed as Yuuri dove at him another time and held the phone high up above his head.

“Are you up then, and going to put on your big boy pants—the ones that I pressed for you last night, you’re welcome by the way—and go to work?” Phichit asked.

Yuuri crossed his arms over his chest.

“I don’t see why that is the only option,” he grumbled.

“If you don’t like the outfit, kiddo, we can pick a different one,” Phichit said with a shrug as he stepped down from the bed and held the phone out to Yuuri. But just as Yuuri reached out to take it, he snatched it away and said, “Or, maybe we can ask Victor for advice.”

“No!” Yuuri cried. “Come on, I’ll get dressed. I’ll go to work. Just give me back my phone, please.”

“Fine,” Phichit said with a shrug, tossing the phone over his shoulder onto the bed.

But then, because apparently Phichit was feeling a little mischievous after all, as Yuuri dove after it, Phichit grabbed a hold of the edge of the towel that was around his waist, unraveling it and leaving Yuuri bare as he landed on the bed on his stomach.

“Phichit!” Yuuri screamed, grabbing his phone in one hand and doing his best to attempt to flip his duvet up over his now exposed behind with the other.

Phichit whistled.

“Look at that ass!”

“I’m gonna, I’m gonna,” Yuuri tried to come up with a threat as he tangled himself up in his duvet until only his head was popping out. “You’re too shameless, I can’t think of a way to get you back!” Yuuri whined.

Phichit smiled.

“Eh,” he shrugged. “Someday, I’m sure I’ll like a boy or have an important job and you can give me a much-needed kick in the ass to help me get over myself too. That’s what friends are for.”

Yuuri huffed.

“Just—leave me,” he groaned, falling over face first into the bed so now all you could see on the bed was a large duvet covered blob.

“If you’re not out of this room in another fifteen minutes, I’m going to snap a picture of your Victor shrine and send it to him sometime.”

Yuuri just grumbled indistinctly from under the duvet blob.

“Love you too!” Phichit called out as he left the room, shutting the door behind him, even if he knew that was not at all what Yuuri had said.

*

When Yuuri got to the studio that first morning, he had a hard time getting through the gate.

Which felt like a fucking cliché—overnight success newcomer shows up for their first day at work on a Hollywood backlot and can’t get past security.

Thankfully though, Victor Nikiforov did not pull up alongside him, smile charismatically at the security guard, and say something along the lines of, _“He’s with me.”_

If that would have happened, Yuuri might have been forced to say, _“Actually, never mind, I am a stalker trying to break onto the lot—sorry, I’ll see myself out.”_

But because that hadn’t happened, instead Yuuri stood on the pedestrian side of the security booth (because Yuuri ever so glamorously had taken an Uber to the studio), scrolling through his email on his phone trying to find the number of someone who he could call who might be able to get his security clearance resent to security or come down and get him.

“I’m really sorry,” Yuuri apologized for a third time to the security guard. It was of course the security guards fault, technically, that they were in this situation to begin with that had led Yuuri to apologizing repeatedly for the sake of having something to say to fill the tense silence.

But then again, the security guard was probably only doing his job.

“Oh wait, I found you, they have a different spelling of your name here. Y-U-R-I K-A-T-S-K-I,” the guard said.

“Oh, that’s a more phonetic spelling,” Yuuri murmured, helplessly.

When he’d registered with SAG last year, he’d insisted on keeping his name spelled slightly more traditionally. Not that there was really anything traditional about the Latin alphabet anyway when it came to his Japanese name, but none the less, he’d been determined not to try and make himself more convenient just for the sake of Americans.

But he was steadily regretting it as his name was spelled or pronounced wrong again and again, one way or another.

The guard shrugged and handed Yuuri a visitor pass.

“Just stop by the office some time today and have them make up an ID for you.”

“Right,” Yuuri said. “Okay. Thank you,” he stammered. “Have a good day,” he called out as an afterthought as he walked away.

And then after that, the day showed no signs of improving as he found himself stumbling across the lot, unable to find the right building in a sea of beige stucco buildings. It wasn’t one of the big sound stages, right? They were doing a table read, there had to be a building more office-like somewhere, right?

Then he was almost run over by a golf cart.

Of course.

“Watch were you’re walking!” someone shouted and Yuuri watched with wide eyes as a golf cart slammed to a stop just inches from him.

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” Yuuri gasped. The girl that was driving the cart stared back at him.

Then for some reason she blushed.

“No! I should be apologizing!” she said. “Sorry, I’m just running late, I needed to get this cart back across the lot like ten minutes ago.”

Yuuri smiled and hoped it somehow didn’t look as pained as it felt.

“Ah, that’s alright. I’m running late too,” he said with a shrug.

“Oh! Where are you going? I know this lot like the back of my hand—only damn thing I’ve learned in this internship—maybe I can give you a short cut?”

“Oh, no, it’s fine, I’ll figure it out, I don’t want to keep you.”

“No, it’s fine. No one will probably even care, really, if I’m late, I’m just paranoid,” she said. “Hey, how about I give you a ride?”

“Oh no!” Yuuri said quickly. “It’s really alright!”

“Oh, come on, arguing with me is just going to make us both late,” she said. “Hop on!”

With great hesitancy, Yuuri slid into the cart and perched himself on the edge of the seat carefully, as if the golf cart was some fragile and important thing he was at risk of breaking—even though just moments ago it had been the cart that had almost broken him.

“Hold on!” the girl said. “I’m admittedly not very good at driving this.”

Yuuri reluctantly planted his feet slightly firmer on the floor of the cart but didn’t make any other effort to increase the amount of himself that was coming in contact with it.

However, his idiocy and blatant disregard of instructions for no apparent reason turned out to be a terrible, terrible mistake—

Because then the golf cart lurched to a start and he nearly fell out of his seat. Thankfully, instead he managed to catch himself on the edge of the steering wheel. Less thankfully, he’d managed to grab the exact same spot on the wheel the girl was already holding, accidently crushing her hand under his and nearly steering them into a bush.

Thankfully, the girl slammed on the breaks.

“Oh my god I’m so sorry!” the girl cried at the same time Yuuri gasped, “Shit, I’m sorry!”

For a second, they looked at each other. Then the girl looked away from him towards—oh! he was still crushing her hand.

Yuuri quickly pulled away.

“Sorry,” he murmured, daring to glance up at the girl.

The expression on her face was strange though, and he quickly ducked his head and looked away.

“So, um,” the girl said after another long moment passed, “I never asked where you were headed.”

“Oh, it’s the G- something building,” Yuuri said, suddenly unable to remember the combination of letters in the email he’d gotten with instructions for where to show up that morning.

“Oh, the Goldman building?” she asked.

Yuuri nodded, although if there was another G-named building on the lot, he was screwed.

“We’ll that’s right around the corner. Hold on _tight_ this time,” she said and Yuuri grabbed a hold of the roof of cart as it started to move again, this time slightly less abruptly.

They rode in awkward silence across the lot, although Yuuri supposed awkward silence was better than awkward small talk. This morning really was a disaster, and it certainly didn’t bode well for the rest of the day.

And then, just because things couldn’t get any worse, suddenly, someone called out his name.

“Yuuri!”

And Yuuri whipped his head around to see none other than Victor Nikiforov waving to him.

“Is that—” the girl whispered as she slammed the cart to a stop in front of a building and incidentally only a few feet from Victor. “Victor Nikiforov?”

Yuuri closed his eyes.

“Evidently,” he murmured, suddenly aware of heat rising to his cheeks for absolutely no apparent reason.

“Yuuri!” Victor called again.

Yuuri opened his eyes.

“It appears I’m being summoned,” he muttered, and the girl gasped. “Thank you so much for helping me out,” he said, reaching out to tap the steering wheel, very carefully _next_ to where the girl was clutching it. “Really. And I’m sorry for making you late.”

“Oh, it’s uh, no problem, really.”

Yuuri stepped out of the cart and offered the girl a slight bow of his head before walking around the cart over to Victor.

“Good morning,” he said doing his best to try and pretend he wasn’t beyond ready to crawl back into bed.

“Morning Yuuri!” Victor exclaimed, apprently not as devoted to hiding from the day as Yuuri was, and in fact maybe even excited by it. “I got this for you!” he said, holding out a paper take-away cup.

“Hm?” Yuuri hiccupped.

“It’s green tea!” Victor proclaimed.

For a second, all Yuuri could do was stare.

“Try it, tell me if it’s okay!”

Helplessly, Yuuri took the cup and took a sip.

Except the drink was scalding and Yuuri couldn’t taste anything, unless _searing pain_ was a flavor.

“Mm,” Yuuri tried to cover up his hiss of pain. “It’s very good.”

Yuuri forced himself to look up at the other man as he said it, but he watched as Victor’s eyes widened and became the best human embodiment of puppy-dog eye’s that Yuuri had ever seen.

“Oh, are you sure?” he said. “I have some honey if it’s not.”

And then, Victor reached into the pocket of his jacket and pulled out an entire little plastic bear shaped honey bottle.

Now it was Yuuri’s eyes that widened.

“Oh, no,” Yuuri said quickly. “It’s alright. it’s very good,” Yuuri said, taking another sip, trying to splash as little scalding liquid as he could into his mouth. “Delicious.”

“ _Vkunso_ ,” Victor murmured, and Yuuri wasn’t sure if he was speaking to him. “Take the honey anyway, I have no use for it.”

“You never drink tea?” Yuuri said, but as the words left his mouth Yuuri realized there were probably few things that he could have said that were more irrelevant and unnecessary.

“Ah,” Victor said, looking a little unsure and pausing for a moment, “In Russia sometimes we actually sweeten tea with jam!” he announced boisterously. “So you can take the honey. I do not need it!”

Yuuri was so shocked by Victor’s sudden… whatever this was that he found himself reaching out and taking the offered honey bear.

It occurred to Yuuri as he did this though that the chances that he was going to be able to just casually use this honey, or even look at it without feeling crippling levels of embarrassment, was absurdly small.

“So you’re sure the tea is alright?” Victor asked again. “If you don’t love it, I’ll bring you another kind tomorrow. Until we find one you like the best.”

Yuuri could stop his eyes from widening in horror.

“Oh, no that’s not necessary!” he said quickly. “We’re even now, right?”

For a moment, Victor’s face morphed into an unreadable expression.

Then in another he was smiling brightly again in a way that Yuuri could best describe as _manic_.

“Oh of course!” he said, and Yuuri made the mistake of letting out a breath he’d been holding. “We’ll take turns. You’ll bring the drinks tomorrow!”

Suddenly feeling very exhausted and _finally_ realizing it wasn’t worth arguing, Yuuri did about the only polite person gesture he could manage and tried to smile, but only just got the corner of one side of his mouth to quirk as he looked up at Victor.

“Ah, we should get inside, shouldn’t we?” Yuuri said, accepting that Victor could probably con him into being his PA, his errand boy, just by breathing.

So of course Yuuri was going to bring coffee tomorrow if it at least meant that Victor wouldn’t be the one getting it.

“Oh! Yes!” Victor said. “I’d say we’d be late, but they can’t really start without us, can they?”

“I don’t think that makes us not late, I think that just means we’re holding everyone up,” Yuuri murmured anxiously.

“Oh, right,” Victor said, scratching the back of his neck. “Well, I suppose we could just blame it on you, I had been waiting for you for a while before you finally showed up.”

Yuuri almost dropped his coffee cup as a wave of anxiety and despair and a general feeling of doom and you’re-going-to-fuck-this-up swept through him.

Victor, however, did not even seem to notice.

And that was the moment Yuuri accepted that this day was going about as horribly as it could possibly go.

*

As far as Victor was concerned, the day was going about as horribly as it could possibly go.

For one thing, Yuuri was currently sitting across the table from him, reading a scene with such conviction that Victor could hardly think straight, none the less read his line in response.

For another, Victor had spent two hours researching tea shops in LA within a five-mile radius of the studio to find the one that seemed to have the most belief in their green tea quality. He’d even gone as far as to call the finalists to confirm that they could speak to the quality of their teas with passion.

Yuri had caught him doing this, of course—talking on the phone in a slightly purposefully tacky American accent, asking some poor barista if they knew the region of China their green tea came from—and although the list of things Yuri regularly ridiculed him for was already long, he supposed he wasn’t going to live this down none the less.

But all that work—he’d been mocked by his cousin, he’d had several awkward conversations with baristas, he’d driven out of his way to pick up the tea he’d finally chosen, he’d ordered it extra hot to make sure it didn’t go cold on the way to the studio—only for Yuuri to take one sip and look at Victor like he’d been handed a cup of bile.

And then, oh god, the honey.

He’d actually grabbed it from his own cabinet that morning, and yet had started rambling about only putting jam in his tea for some godforsaken reason and insisted that Yuuri take it. But actually Victor never drank jam in his tea. Victor didn’t _like_ jam in his tea. Victor probably hadn’t purposefully bought jam in years, maybe even never.

And Victor could see the stupid little honey bear sticking out of the side pocket of Yuuri’s messenger bag that was hanging off the back of his chair and Victor had never felt like more of an idiot.

But it was all Yuuri’s fault that he was so flustered!

 _He_ was the one who had rolled up in a golf cart fashionably late, looking like the textbook definition of a movie star, complete with a girl ogling him like Yuuri could ask her anything and she’d say yes.

 _He_ was the one who had stood there with this girl drooling over him, with Victor himself drooling over him, probably, and was still just so—unaffected.

How was he so unaffected?

And then Victor clearly had served him piss and he smiled and thanked him. He’d presented him with a gift of slightly used honey and he'd accepted it modestly.

And then, and then—Yuuri had smiled at him and Viktor could have cried at the sight of it. It was the kind of most perfect, earnest, little quirk of the lips that had ever happened in all of human history, Victor was sure.

And then, Victor had said something thoughtless and arrogant, just trying to be as cool as Yuuri was, and Yuuri had called him out. But he’d done it so kindly.

And—

“Victor!” the director shouted, “It’s your line!”

“Oh,” Victor mumbled. God, and now he was getting yelled at by a director? Victor hadn’t gotten yelled at by a director in years. “Where were we?”

“I love you,” Yuuri said from across the table.

“What?” Victor startled.

There was no way Yuuri could be they’d only just met, was it in like a friendly way, it didn’t make sense, but Victor would take it, maybe—

“That’s your line,” Yuuri clarified. “ _I love you_.”

“Oh,” Victor said, scanning down his script. They were a little more than half way through the movie, well into the second act, and agents Neil Reilley, Calen Kensey, and Alyson Cobbler, played by Sara Crispino, were just about to head off on their rescue mission. “Right. _I love you_.”

“ _Could you two idiots get going?_ ” Sara read from besides Victor, “ _We’re going to be late_.”

“ _Aw, don’t be that way Alyson_ ,” Yuuri read. “ _We love you too. Right Calen?_ ”

Yuuri was looking at him across the table, smiling brightly.

It took Victor too long to remember that he was acting.

There was a loud cough from the director.

“ _Right,_ ” Victor read, after an inexcusably long pause. “ _We love us our Aly_.”

“Okay, okay, how about we take a break?” the director called out after Sara read out the last line of the scene, looking at Victor in frustration. “Twenty minutes. And Victor, can we chat?”

Victor shot a glance back at Yuuri before pushing his chair back from the table to follow the director out of the room, feeling like a dog with his tail between his legs.

*

“So,” Sara said, looking at Yuuri. “What did you do to Victor?”

Yuuri blinked across the table.

“I—I didn’t do anything,” he stammered.

Sara was playing the young rookie detective who gets dragged off on a life or death stakes rogue international mission with two long time partners, Neil Reilley, played by Yuuri, and Calen Kensey, played by Victor.

He’d seen her last year in some indie rom-com that was good. She seemed like a very chill kind of person. But maybe only if by chill you meant mercilously blunt, it would appear.

“All we have to do today is read words off a piece of paper, and the multi-Golden Globe Winning and Oscar winning actor Victor Nikiforov can’t even do that, and it seems it must have something to do with you.”

 _Oh, god_ , Yuuri thought and crumpled a bit, everything that went wrong on this film really was going to be his fault, wasn’t it?

Because that was true, Victor Nikiforov has been involved in a project that would win a Golden Globe or an Oscar every year for the past five years in a row for something or another—something fairly unprecedented. And three of those awards were Oscars for Best Actor in a Leading Role. Three. In five years.

And now for some reason Victor couldn’t even deliver lines read off a script? Victor had acted with almost everyone else on the cast at some point before. The only new addition was Yuuri.

“Am I really that bad?” Yuuri murmured, unable to bring himself to look at Sara.

But when Sara didn’t say anything, Yuuri managed to bring himself to steal a glance.

She was just staring at him, her face scrunched in confusion.

“Huh,” was all she said, finally.

Yuuri chewed on the inside of his lip.

“I’ll work on it tonight, and every night. I swear I’ll be ready by the time the cameras are rolling!” Yuuri exclaimed suddenly.

He may have already been devoting every moment of his life to this project, but surely he could work harder.

He _would_ work harder, if that’s what it took to not let everyone else down.

But Sara just looked more confused.

“No, it’s not that. You really think—” but she was interrupted.

“Yuuri,” Victor called out, peeking back into the room. “Can you come out here?”

Oh no.

“Alright,” Yuuri said though, swallowing the terror that he was going to be scolded or maybe even fired.

He slid out of the room and followed Victor out into the hall to where the director was waiting for them.

“Alright you two,” he said, sounding a bit exasperated. “I don’t know what is going on with you two, but whatever it is, you need to work it out.”

“What?” Yuuri asked.

“I don’t have time for this to be the project that made the mistake of hiring some big-name actor whose peaked and his name is now worth more than his talent and some bright-eyed newcomer who we’ll see in retrospect is only a one-trick pony.”

Yuuri thought all his internal organs might have been spontaneously combusting inside of him.

“Oh,” Yuuri said.

“I’m going to call for lunch for everyone else, you two are going to stay behind and work on reading the final scene, alright? And I want you ready to finish up the read this afternoon, alright?” the director announced.

Yuuri managed to get himself to nod.

And with that, Victor and Yuuri were directed into an empty meeting room next door to the conference room they’d been doing the read through in.

“Do you need to go back to the other room and grab your book?” Victor asked as the door clicked shut behind them.

“No,” Yuuri murmured.

“Okay, well then—” Victor started but paused as Yuuri lay down on the floor. “What are you doing?”

“The script says we’re lying on the floor together.”

“Oh,” Victor said. “Right.”

And then he lay down right next to him, his head beside Yuuri’s.

“Oh,” Yuuri breathed.

“What?”

“Nothing, it’s just I’ve been having Phichit lie the other way. Head to feet.”

“What’s a Phichit?”

“My roommate, he’s been practicing with me at home.”

“And he’d lay the other way?”

“Well, I told him too. I thought it—it just made more sense. The shot is supposed to be overhead, we’ll be on our backs, it looks better, make the action of us talking take up more of the screen, it makes more sense for the characters, etc. But if you want to lay like this, we can—it’s your choice.”

“No,” Victor said. “We can lay the other way. I hadn’t given it that much thought.”

Yuuri didn’t say anything as Victor got up and lay down again, this time his head by Yuuri’s feet.

“So, do you just want to start then?” Victor asked.

Yuuri nodded, it not even occurring to him Victor couldn’t see his head and started.

“ _Cal_ ,” Yuuri said, staring up at the ceiling, “ _I’m not sure I want to do this anymore_.”’

Yuuri couldn’t see Victor’s face. He wished he could see Victor’s face.

“ _Okay,”_ Victor said, more quickly that Phichit had, and more frankly. “ _I understand.”_ Then he took a pause and became gentler _. “There are other things to do in the world besides this. I’m sure any of those things would be happy to have you_.”

“ _But—”_ Yuuri said, faster than he usually did, nearly jumping his line, and froze at the mistake. “ _What if—what if I don’t want anything, anymore?”_

“ _Nothing?”_  Victor asked, and Yuuri felt him sit up. “ _What—what about me?”_

Yuuri was always the one to sit up here—should he stay down if Victor sat up? In compromise, he rolled over onto his side, propping his head up on his arm to look at Victor.

“ _That’s not what I—”_ Yuuri said murmured. “ _You don’t need me. We should end this_.”

And it was like the universe fractured—the silence that fell after those words as Yuuri looked at Victor.

And then the fracture grew to a full shattering as a tear rolled down Victor’s cheek.

“What?” Yuuri gasped, breaking script, and slamming his mouth shut as soon as the word escaped.

“ _Fine,”_ Victor whispered and then took another long pause as tears fell.

Yuuri sat the rest of the way up, getting to his knees to go over and kneel in front of Victor, as if compelled.

And then when he started to reach out, he almost stopped himself, but then a voice in his head reminded him, _“You aren’t Yuuri, you’re Neil. And this isn’t Victor, it’s Calen. You aren’t strangers separated by worlds and a lifetime. You’re best friends. Nearly brothers. You love him.”_

And so, Yuuri wiped a tear from Victor’s cheek with his thumb.

Victor sniffed.

 _“But that’s not the leap you’re making_ ,” Victor said after another moment, his voice steadier as the tears stopped.

Yuuri’s hand fell from Victor’s face.

“ _I didn’t mean it like that_.”

“ _Yes you did_ ,” Victor said. “ _I_ know _you, Neil_.”

“ _Cal_ ,” Yuuri said.

Victor just shook his head. Then he stood up.

“ _No,”_ he murmured, looking at the ground, seemingly not even talking to Yuuri. Or Neil. Or whatever.

And Yuuri, suddenly feeling terribly unbalanced as Victor stood over Yuuri while he knelt, stood up.

“ _Wait, I know,”_ Victor said _,_ still seeming distracted _._

Victor dug into his pocket and pulled out his phone, putting on the song. He didn’t move a muscle though as the music began to play.

“ _What does this have to do with anything?”_ Yuuri asked, staying equally frozen from where he stood across from Victor.

It was actually a song from earlier in a movie. It had come on in a club and Neil, Calen, and Alyson had danced to it, in a fun, carefree moment amid the chaos. It made a lot of sense to reprise it narratively.

But now they were at the part of the scene Yuuri couldn’t get right.

They were already standing, so Victor couldn’t help Yuuri up like Yuuri had had Phichit doing. There was nothing to do but stare at each other.

“ _What doesn’t it?”_ Victor returned, offering Yuuri a smile.

And then, as the lyrics started, Victor began to lip sync them, and started hoping around in the cheesiest dance.

Like Hugh Grant in Love Actually dancing around 10 Downing Street level cheesy.

And Yuuri just stood there in shock.

“ _Come on,”_ Victor said, grabbing Yuuri’s hands and spinning him around.

And they danced. Badly and freverously. 

And Yuuri found himself laughing. And Victor laughed too, his eyes shining.

And for a second, Yuuri did forget that he was Yuuri Katsuki and that Victor was Victor Nikiforov. For a second, they could have been best friends. They could have been Calen and Neil. They could have been anyone or anything.

As long as they didn’t stop dancing. As long as the scene didn’t end.

So keep dancing is what Yuuri did.

And as the song came to an end, Victor collapsed onto the ground, pulling Yuuri down beside him.

They were head to head this time.

And Yuuri looked at Victor.

And Victor looked at Yuuri.

And they smiled.

And without giving it another thought, Yuuri leaned forward, until his lips were against the corner of Victor’s jaw. And then—years later he would not be sure what possessed him to do this, he could only blame Neil—he stuck his tongue out and licked across Victor’s cheek.

And, maybe because Victor was a professional, maybe because he was the best and most generous actor in the business, Victor laughed.

And pushed Yuuri away from him by the shoulders, wiping at his wet cheek.

And maybe because Yuuri wasn’t Yuuri in this moment, maybe because this moment didn’t feel real, Yuuri laughed again too, flopping back over onto his back.

“That—” Victor said, speaking as himself now evidently since they’d run out of lines Yuuri knew, but he still somehow felt like he was in the scene. A part of Yuuri still wanted to keep pretending—wasn’t going to stop pretending as long as he could keep the moment from shattering. “Was perfect.”

He sounded a little awestruck.

Yuuri rolled over again to look at him.

“Yeah?” he asked. “Really?”

“Perfect. That lick alone was worthy of a lifetime achievement award. It was—the most unexpected thing that’s ever happened to me in my decade plus of acting.”

“Well,” Yuuri found himself saying, “Everything you did kept surprising me, I guess—I guess I just had to find a way to top it. That’s what Neil’s and Calen’s relationship is like, isn’t it? Full of competitive spirit?” he asked. “It wasn’t too ridiculous?” 

Victor didn’t say anything in response to that, and instead just sat up.

“I think we must still have some time for lunch—you want to come get something to eat with me?” Victor asked.

And Yuuri, still not feeling quite like Yuuri, and probably only because of that, said without hesitation—

“Okay.”


	4. Two Left Feet (Or, Yuuri has Confusing Definitions of Friendship)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Phichit had concerns.

It was the middle of the night when Phichit stumbled out of his room to go to the bathroom across the hall.

It was when he stumbled back that he noticed the light still on out in the living room.

He stumbled down the hall to go turn it off. That’s when he found Yuuri, asleep on the couch, a stack of books and a heavily marked up script lying open on the coffee table.

The clock on the cable box told him it was 3:28.

And Phichit had concerns.

It had been about two weeks since Yuuri started working on the new film, the very last of preproduction and rehearsals had wrapped and a shooting set to officially start tomorrow.

And Yuuri had been killing himself over it. All he did was work—and it seemed like he was trying to condense a BA in Drama down into days, on top of spending several hours most days in meetings, fittings, and rehearsals.

And even worse, Yuuri wasn’t telling Phichit about any of it.

The only thing that Phichit could seem to get Yuuri to engage with at all was suggesting he occasionally eat a meal, and even then, the response he got was only, “ _I had some of those premade meal prep meal things delivered that Chris used to eat on_ Ice Masters _when he had to maintain his six pack, could you reheat one for me?_ ” or “ _Could you order from the place that does the grain bowls? Except for get mine without the grain._ ”

And in another circumstance Phichit may have teased Yuuri for becoming _so LA_ so quickly, if it weren’t for the fact that Phichit knew if it got to the point where Yuuri was noticeably worrying about his diet, the list of other things that he was worrying about that were remaining hidden inside of him was miles long.

And considering that Yuuri had presumably been spending a considerable amount of time these past two weeks with Victor Nikiforov, and Phichit had barely been able to pry any details from him besides, “ _We’re taking turns making the morning coffee runs_ ,” and “ _He’s surprising_ ,” whatever the fuck that meant, Phichit was extra doubly concerned.

“Yuuri,” Phichit whispered, stroking hair off of his friends forehead, “Do you want to get into your bed? You don’t need your back all funky on your first day of filming.”

“Hm,” Yuuri mumbled, folding his arms against his chest and shifting in his sleep, looking so small and endearing it made Phichit’s heart do a half-broken-with-worry flip-flop.

“Yuuri?” he tried again.

This time, Yuuri gasped, his eyes flying open.

“I’m sorry!” was the first thing out of his mouth and Phichit’s heart did a fully-broken-with-worry flip-flop.

“What are you sorry for?” Phichit asked.

“Phichit?” was all Yuuri murmured as he seemed to realize where he was and with who.

“Come on,” Phichit said, looking at Yuuri sympathetically as the other man wiped at his eyes tiredly. “Let’s get you to bed.”

Yuuri looked at his books and the script on the table.

“No, I should do a bit more—”

“No,” Phichit said, uninterested in hearing it.

“But—” Yuuri protested.

“No,” Phichit repeated. “Now, get up, and let’s get you to bed.”

“No, really—”

But Phichit wasn’t hearing it, and so instead he slid his arms under Yuuri, and with a grunt picked his friend up off the couch, pulling him against his chest bridal style.

“What—” Yuuri said startled, but thankfully for the most part remained still.

Yuuri had a couple inches on Phichit, but probably not the few pounds that usually went with it after the past two weeks of half-eaten macro balanced meal prep and grain-less grain bowls.

But it still wasn’t graceful, Phichit carrying Yuuri down the hallway. His steps were a bit stilted, and when they only got half way out of the living room and Yuuri protested, “Okay, okay, I get it, you can put me down,” Phichit gladly did.

But he wrapped his arm around Yuuri’s shoulder and led him into his bedroom.

And then he turned down the bed (which he had made up himself that very morning after Yuuri left, because Yuuri otherwise definitely would have left his bed unmade day after day until the blankets were so tangled, he was using them more as a pillow, his too small decorative throw draped over him instead as his blanket) and tucked Yuuri in.

Then he walked around to the other side and got in himself.

“What are you doing?” Yuuri asked.

“Making sure you lay here and actually go to sleep, instead of waiting ten minutes for me to and sneaking back to go study.”

“It’s nearly four A.M.” Yuuri insisted, though he whispered. “I should probably be getting up soon anyway.

“You really shouldn’t,” Phichit returned.

“I could just wait for you to fall asleep here,” Yuuri pointed out.

Phichit closed his eyes and sighed.

He had so many concerns.

Then, he scooched over so he was saddled right up next to Yuuri and threw and arm and a leg over him, effectively creating a cage of his limbs to keep Yuuri trapped.

“Go to sleep, Yuuri,” he said gently. nestling his own head down into Yuuri’s shoulder.

Thankfully, this time Yuuri didn’t protest.

*

Yuuri was late.

Now, Yuuri was occasionally late. Often, in fact. But typically only a few minutes. It was almost teasing in a way that Victor wondered (hoped?) was intentional—some kind of seductive powerplay, leaving Victor Nikiforov standing on the side walk, waiting just for him.

Not that Yuuri was trying to seduce him, of course.

Unfortunately (?).

But Yuuri was just so enigmatic.

For the most part, Yuuri seemed fairly aloof. Polite, but irritatingly formal. Kind, but maybe a little purposefully obtuse.

But then there would be these moments where Yuuri suddenly became—as far as Victor was concerned, anyway—well, everything.

Unfortunately, most of those moments seemed to occur only when Yuuri was acting.

But today, Victor had been now standing on the sidewalk for twenty minutes—the ten minutes that he was usually early, plus an additional ten of waiting. Yuuri had never kept his waiting more than five.

And, Victor immediately began to catastrophize.

What if Yuuri had been in a car accident? What if he quit the film? What if the director had called him late last night to let him know that they had purposefully switched around the filming schedule to make it so Victor and Yuuri were on set at the same time as little as possible?

What if he’d been distracted this morning by a lover? What if instead of being here, with Victor, he’d called in sick while someone made themselves at home between his legs for some warm and lazy morning—

“I’m so sorry!” someone panted from beside him, and Victor looked up to see Yuuri.

“You’re late!” Victor said, although, _obviously_.

“Sorry, the line at the coffee shop was a mile long, I missed my second uber and had to order another one, and—” Yuuri paused. “I got you tea this morning, the wait for expresso drinks was ages and they were out of plain coffee and—” Yuuri panted. “I got you jam though, for it. Like you like. The barista looked at me like I was crazy though.”

Victor’s heart for a second soared at the notion that amazing, brilliant, effortless Yuuri remembered something about little old him.

But then he had to take the offered take away cup from Yuuri, and a little single serve pot of jam, and he looked at both of them helplessly.

“Oh, here, I’ll hold the tea while you put the jam in, okay?” Yuuri said quickly, practically ripping the cup back out of Victor’s hand and taking off the lid.

Carefully, Victor opened the little pot.

“Oh, wait, I forgot a spoon!” Yuuri said. “They’ll have some at catering though, probably, we can go—”

Yuuri stopped, as for god knows what reason, Victor stuck his finger into the jam and scooped it out, the blob of jam falling into the tea with a plop.

Then he stuck his now-sticky finger into his mouth. Yuuri watched him silently, his mouth slightly agape and his eyes wide.

Oh.

Was that a bit gross?

It was, wasn’t it?

Was Yuuri one of those people who absolutely never picked up food off the floor that had only been there for a few seconds and ate it? Was Yuuri one of those people who wouldn’t share a straw or offer someone a bite off their fork, no matter how close they otherwise were?

Then a horrifying thought struck Victor—was Yuuri the kind of person that wouldn’t let a dog give them kisses on the cheek?

No, no. He couldn’t be.

“I—ah,” Victor stammered. “I’ll wash my hands when I go into make-up.”

Yuuri just looked at him, his brow furrowing.

“Uh, okay,” he said, and Victor made a note to google proper hand washing technique. Was there an app for that? Wait—phones were filthy weren’t they, should he buy one of those little boxes that clean phones with light? And he’d get Clorox wipes for his trailer. And one of those little hand sanitizer key chains as well. If Yuuri didn’t like germs, Victor would take up arms against them. He’d fight all the germs on Yuuri’s behalf.

He’d even train Makka to show affection in some way that didn’t involve her tongue. She could already shake paws, but there had to be other tricks. And he’d brush her teeth more often, just in case. That wasn’t a bad thing, even. Her breath did stink sometimes. And he’d seen videos on Instagram of dogs who would give hugs on command. That was pretty cute.

Yes—it would be fine. Victor could work with this. Love was about compromise, yes.

Not that he _loved_ Yuuri, of course, but—

“Oh my god,” a disgruntled voice shouted. “There you two are!”

Victor turned to see the director, a small army of other crew members behind him.

“You were both due to costuming ten minutes ago!” he announced. “I swear to god, if we go over budget because you two waste time like that is your job, I’m going to bill you for it! Because guess what your job actually is?”

“To do whatever you tell us to, whenever you tell us to,” Yuuri murmured, seeming frustrated himself. “I’m sorry, we’re coming right away.”

And with that, Yuuri put the lid back on Victor’s tea and handed it to him and followed the director.

Victor took a nervous gulp of his tea and hurried after, feeling awfully embarrassed, but more about being scolded in front of Yuuri than about being scolded in general.

Then he swirled his cup a bit and took another sip of his tea.

It was sweet. (Like Yuuri.)

Maybe jam in tea wasn’t so bad after all.

*

The make-up artist tutted at Yuuri as he sat in the chair.

Not that Yuuri expected any different, probably—he knew he looked like shit.

But, Yuuri had had the courtesy of having his morning mental breakdown before they did his make-up, at least.

He could have gone off and locked himself in his trailer after they’d done it and had a good stress cry until his mascara was running and his foundation was streaky.

But he’d been strategic. All his time was precious, he was learning. And he technically didn’t have time for a breakdown this morning, but of course it’s always the days where he couldn’t spare even a second to wallow, none the less have a full-blown panic attack, that Yuuri found himself behind the nearest lockable door, curled in on himself and on the verge of drowning in his own snot.

“Wear this for a few minutes,” the make-up artist, who’d introduced himself as Seung-gil, said as he handed him what appeared to Yuuri to be a gel ice pack in the shape of an eye mask.

Yuuri put the mask on without argument and sighed, glancing nervously over at Victor, who sat a few chairs down and was chatting amicably with his stylist. The stupid tea that Yuuri had brought him was still in his hand.

God, this morning had been a disaster.

Phichit, with the best of intentions, had dragged Yuuri to bed last night, but in the process, left Yuuri’s phone on the coffee table—meaning he couldn’t hear the alarm when it went off in the morning. And then Phichit, who had slept with Yuuri instead of in his own room, missed his alarm as well.

So Yuuri woke up late.

And it was of course on his day to do the coffee run, because they were still doing that for some reason even though shouldn’t Victor-actual-fucking-Nikiforov have an actual assistant to do that?

But instead, every other day for the past two weeks, Yuuri would leave his apartment an hour early to make sure he had time to take one Uber to the coffee shop, wait in line and pick up his order, and then take a second Uber the rest of the way to the studio.

And then because he very well could not have his Uber drive onto the lot, he had to walk all the way from the street, through security, and across the lot, all while carrying Victor’s coffee.

And even still he was usually barely on time, and sometimes not even that.

He’d considered complaining to Phichit about the ridiculousness of it all, but first of all, his usual allotment of complain to Phichit time had been cut from the schedule. Plus, Yuuri had a gnawing feeling that if he told Phichit anything about his interactions with Victor over the past week, Phichit would just insist that it all meant that Victor Nikiforov was in fact in love with him.

And Yuuri’s fantasize-about-Victor-Nikiforov and worry-he-wasn’t-worthy-of-love-and-would-die-alone time had also been cut from their regular spot in his schedule in the name of dealing with the incomprehensible antics of the actual Victor Nikiforov.

Because the fact of the matter was, if you looked at the situation externally, you might have thought that Yuuri and Victor were friends.

And Yuuri knew better—having a decent relationship with costars made the process of filming 100 times less sucky. And Victor was known for being friendly and likable and generous. He was probably like this with everyone. So, maybe in a way, he and Victor were friends. They brought each other coffee. They ate lunch together most days. Victor would often prattle on endlessly and effortlessly in a way that Yuuri couldn’t, but admittedly didn’t hate. But Victor Nikiforov probably had a lot of friends, being in this industry as long and successfully as he had been. Yuuri was just probably one of the least important ones.

“Alright,” Seung-gil said, “Let’s take another look.”

Yuuri took off the mask and tried to hand it back to the other man.

“No, you keep it,” the man said, turning away from Yuuri to grab something from the vanity. “Stick it in the fridge in your trailer, and next time, wear it for five or ten minutes before you come to me.”

“Oh, thanks,” Yuuri said, fiddling with the mask in his lap as Seung-gil turned back and started to rub some kind of lotion into his skin.

“You’re one of those obsessive, people pleaser types, aren’t you?” he asked, squirting a second kind of lotion-type-product into his hand and rubbing it around Yuuri’s eyes.

(Phichit would be so disappointed in him for not knowing what any of these products were.)

“What?” Yuuri startled.

“It’s the first day of filming, and you’re already showing signs of burnout. And not only is it making my job harder, but it’s going to make everyone else’s harder too. Cut yourself a break. It’s not helping,” he said, bluntly.

Wha—what? For a second, Yuuri could only gape.

Seung-gil seemed to use the opportunity to rub something into his lips.

“Rub your lips together,” he instructed.

“Excuse me?” Yuuri sputtered, finally catching up.

“Like this,” Seung-gil said, and then proceeded to curl his lips inward and rub them together.

“No, I mean—”

“I know what you meant. What do you have to say about it?”

“I—” Yuuri said, but then paused. “No matter what I do, it’s going to be wrong,” Yuuri said, his voice barely a whisper. He glanced back over at Victor, who thankfully was still caught in conversation and did not appear to be eavesdropping on him.

“That’s not true,” Seung-gil said casually. “There are a bunch of ways that this project could go wrong, you have to do with a handful of them. There are a bunch of ways this project could go right—and again, you relate to about a handful. You’re just an actor, get over yourself a bit. You aren’t that important.”

“But—”

“But what, oh, you’re the face of this film? And who is currently in charge of your face?” Seung-gil asked with a smirk and Yuuri felt so very taken aback. “Don’t scrunch up your forehead like that, I haven’t set your foundation yet, you’ll crease it.”

Yuuri didn’t know what to say. Seung-gil sighed.

“Look, Katsuki, this isn’t a Hallmark movie. If your performance is shit, someone is going to tell you. You aren’t respected or important enough for someone to lie and tell you you’re good when you’re not. Not when there are millions of dollars stood to be gained or lost. You’re a cog in the wheel. I very pretty cog, but a cog none the less. Embrace it.”

A—a cog.

Yuuri was a cog.

He was _just_ a cog.

“Oh—” was all Yuuri could say in response. “Oh—okay.”

He—well, he still could probably stand to read some books on acting in his free time. Definitely, in fact.

And Victor Nikiforov was probably going to be the death of him, and he needed to be constantly vigilant to prevent that early demise.

But, but maybe he could try and go to bed at a semi-decent hour tonight. After having dinner with Phichit. Maybe they could go get sushi together, carbs be damned.

Seung-gil watched Yuuri for a few moments, but then seemed to see a shift in his face that he approved of, because then he smiled and rolled his eyes.

“Good.”

*

When Phichit got home from his class that night, he found Yuuri in the kitchen, cooking.

Which was a very good sign.

“Hey Yuuri,” Phichit announced himself.

Yuuri didn’t flinch or even turn around.

“I stopped at that fancy market on the way home and got some tuna to make sushi. Don’t ask me how much I spent to ensure it was fresh and high quality enough it’s not going to accidently poison us, I don’t want to talk about it.”

“You’re making sushi.”

“I was going to have us go out to get some, but then,” but Yuuri stopped and just shrugged, but Phichit could imagine. It was a big leap from spending two weeks the physical embodiment of anxiety 24/7 to being ready to go out into the world and face all the unknown factors that went into eating at a restaurant.

Phichit could imagine the wheels of anxiety turning in Yuuri’s mind trying to make that decision— _do we need reservations, should I call the restaurant and ask, what if they say no we don’t take reservations, what if I don’t call and they say we did, what if I book a table using an online app and there is a problem with the reservation, what if we have to wait in line for an hour, what if the restaurant isn’t even actually open, maybe we’ll just order in, but what if the delivery is late or never comes, what if they get the order wrong, what if they can’t get into the apartment building and our access buzzer spontaneously broke, what if, what if what it I just make the sushi myself?_

“That sounds great,” Phichit said, and then he dared follow up with, “How was your day? I’m really sorry for making you late.”

Yuuri just shrugged.

“It’s fine,” Yuuri said. “Though the make-up artist took one look at me and decided that I needed an intervention, so, uh, you know.”

“I take it you don’t mean a style intervention,” Phichit said, trying to act casual when he really wanted to tackle Yuuri with glee for opening up.

“No, like a you’re-going-to-destroy-yourself-to-the-inconvience-of-everyone-around-you-vention.”

“Ah,” Phichit said.

“So I take it you agree then?” Yuuri asked quietly.

Phichit sighed.

“Well, I mean, yeah.”

“Ah.”

“I was worried about you,” Phichit admitted. “Two weeks with your idol and instead of dishing to me about it you’re becoming a bigger expert on the Meisner technique than Meisner himself was.”

“I mean, any approach to acting, or hell, probably just life, that teaches you to get out of your own head, I could probably do to learn from,” Yuuri said, scrunching up his face a bit in that self-deprecating way he did sometimes.

Phichit rolled his eyes.

Oh, his poor, sweet child.

“Has anyone told you that you’re cute today?” he said offhandedly.

Yuuri’s brow knit.

“Um, no,” he said. “And what does that have to do with anything?”

“Well, you’re just like, a really cute guy, Yuuri,” Phichit said, walking over to Yuuri with a swing in his step in an effort at mock seduction. “And I just,” Phichit said, dragging a finger up Yuuri’s chest, “think you’re underestimating how little you can know about acting while still being successful at acting when you’re as cute as you are.”

Then he grabbed a pinch of Yuuri’s cheek between his fingers.

“So cute,” he said, like he was talking to a dog.

Yuuri swatted at him, but still seemed a little flustered even though he should have been used to Phichit’s antics by now.

“St-stop that,” he stammered. “You’re so weird.”

“But you love me,” Phichit said, grinning widely.

“Maybe,” Yuuri said. “Now, help me roll the sushi.”

*

Yuuri and Phichit sat on the couch. It was getting late, a bit later than Yuuri had intended in his plans earlier to stop being such a disaster human, but Phichit had very successfully done that thing that he did better than anyone else on the planet—actually make Yuuri feel even just a tiny bit bad about avoiding human interaction.

Because while usually Yuuri had not feeling sorry about his antisocial tendencies down to a science, Phichit somehow always managed to make him feel really bad when he went to go spend a few days or weeks inside Anxiety Land.

If he asked someone why he felt this guilt, Yuuri knew that they might explain to Yuuri that the reason he felt this way is because he and Phichit were friends, and it was natural to feel guilty about being a dick to your friends.

Yuuri’s grasp on friendship though was historically not that great.

“So, you and Victor really have just been hanging out?” Phichit asked. “And you’re cool with that?”

“Well, I mean, it just kind of is,” Yuuri shrugged. “He’s nice to everyone though, it’s not like it means much.”

“But you talk to him and don’t hyperventilate or cum in your pants or something?”

“No!” Yuuri cried. “Victor’s not… like that.”

“Are you trying to convince me that he is not 5 feet 10 inches of beautiful man god, because really do I need to remind you of your closet yet again?”

“No it’s not that he’s not,” Yuuri blushed. “No, I just mean, he’s very professional. Pretty casual. I’m the one who licked him.”

“Excuse me?” Phichit said. “You _what_?”

Then Yuuri’s phone was ringing.

And Phichit and Yuuri just looked at each other.

Yuuri, looking at Phichit in terror, fearing this was somehow the worst, and Phichit looking back, more likely just startled by the timing.

“You’re not getting out of this,” Phichit said as Yuuri picked up the phone. “Who is it?”

Yuuri’s brow furrowed and he held out the phone for Phichit to see.

“Victor (ﾉ´ з `)ノ” was calling.

“I bet you a million dollars it’s a booty call,” Phichit smiled. “Bet he wants to know where else you can lick.”

“I will give you a million dollars if you make it through this phone call without yelling something embarrassing for him to hear.”

The chances that if Yuuri were going to be fired, they’d task Victor with giving him the news at eleven o’clock at night were pretty small, right? But maybe there was some other production related catastrophe, and Victor was checking to make sure Yuuri had gotten the news that the studio had burned down, or the director had had a massive heart attack the doctors believed was the result of the stress of having to deal with a truly incompetent actor.

Phichit, however, did not seem as concerned and scrunched up his face as he seemed to weigh the pros and cons.

Yuuri, though, didn’t have time to wait for an agreement before he accepted the call.

*

Victor was lying on his couch with Makkachin when something that Yuuri had said to him that morning occurred to him.

And then he texted Chris.

_What kind of car does Yuuri have?_

Chris didn’t respond to him immediately, so with a sigh, Victor turned back to Makkachin.

He took hold of her ears, pulling them away from her head and flapping them, like Dumbo did to fly.

Makkachin looked at him with big, tired puppy dog eyes and sighed, as if making a point that she was politely resigned to Victor’s antics.

“Oh, hush,” Victor said, letting go of her ears to instead scratch behind them. “You have to love me, it’s in the dog handbook.”

Then his phone vibrated on his chest.

“A text, Makka!” he narrated excitedly.

 _Yuuri doesn’t have a car. He can’t drive. Or at least he couldn’t a few months ago, but I don’t imagine it’s changed,_ the text read _._

Then another one came:

_Fun related insider anecdote to feed your Yuuri Katsuki fanboy crush: Yuuri had to film a scene in the car with a stunt driver, and he had to hold the wheel for a few seconds as the car actually just rolled slowly past a green screen and I swore he was going to have a heart attack._

_So when he said he took an Uber to work this morning???_ Victor responded.

Victor had just assumed Yuuri’s car was in the shop, or something. Victor just wanted to know if perhaps he could recommend Yuuri get something more reliable. Or, well, maybe just stumble upon a car of his that he didn’t need anymore that could perhaps be donated to a struggling newcomer.

Then his phone was ringing.

“Ugh, it’s my fault,” Chris said immediately the second Victor answered the phone. “I should have remembered.”

“What?” Victor.

“That Yuuri is almost as big an idiot as you are.”

“What?”

“We filmed most of _Ice Master_ abroad, the studio for the most part arranged our travel. It wouldn’t have occurred to Yuuri that he could ask the studio to still arrange his transport for this project since you’re starting with filming here,” Chris said. “I should have made a call, had it taken care of. I’ll do it in the morning.”

Victor furrowed his brow.

“What?” he asked. “Why would you call for him? This isn’t even your project.”

Chris snorted.

“You want Yuuri Katsuki to make a phone call to ask for people to spend money to make his life easier when there is literally any other option. No, no, darling—I’ll take care of it.”

“What?”

“Look, I don’t know how on earth you’ve gotten this idea in your head that Yuuri isn’t the personification of a deer caught in the headlights, but if you’re not going to take care of him because you’re too busy fantasizing about him fucking you against a wall or something, I’ll step up.”

“What!” Victor gasped. “I have not been fantasizing about any such thing—Yuuri is my colleague!” Victor exclaimed. “And I can take care of him just fine on my own,” he added, not really knowing what that was even supposed to mean as he said it but knowing that it was of the upmost importance that he said it very insistently.

“Oh?” Chris said. “Well then how are you going to save Yuuri from the horrors of ride-share services?”

“I—” Victor said, thinking for a moment. Then it came to him. “We’ll carpool!”

Victor was sure he could hear Chris’s skeptic amusement in the pause of silence.

“Do you even know where he lives?”

“Somewhere in L.A. I presume, I remember it’s not too far from you. And you’re practically my neighbor.”

“I want you to know that I’m rolling my eyes,” Chris said. “And he lives in Echo Park.”

“That isn’t _too_ far,” Victor said.

“Yeah, in the scope of the theory of relativity, it’s not too far. But in actual, real life, in practice, it means you have to drive at least fifteen minutes in the wrong direction and then back, assuming there was absolutely no traffic on the 101. And because that’s not going to happen, you’re really going to be doing is turning your ten-minute commute into an hour and a half one.”

“Well,” Victor said, “I’d been considering buying a second home somewhere. Echo Park is nice.”

“You’re bad Victor, but even you are not that shameless and extra,” Chris said.

“Hm,” was all Victor said in response. “Perhaps. Do you ever listen to podcasts? Have any recommendations?”

“What?”

“Well, I’m going to need something to do on my new hour and a half commute. At least until I can talk to a realtor, that is.”

“Victor, I swear to god—Yuuri will never let you,” Chris said. “There’s no way that boy doesn’t know where you live and that it’s not anywhere near him.”

“I can be very persuasive.”

For a moment there was silence. And then a sigh.

“Okay, fine, shoot your shot. But I’m going to make a fucking PowerPoint of every ridiculous thing you’ve ever done in the name of Yuuri Katsuki to present at your wedding.”

“Deal,” Victor said. “Now if you excuse me, I have to make a call.”

“It is nearly midnight, Victor.”

“Yes, thus the concern to not waste any more time!”

There was a sharp inhale on the other end of the line.

“Whatever, Nikiforov. Have a good night, and don’t come crying to me when Yuuri rejects your sorry ass in panicked confusion.”

Victor opened his mouth, but before he could defend himself, the line clicked dead.

*

“Um, hello?” Yuuri said as he answered the phone.

“Hi Yuuri!” Victor said with the same exuberance he always did. Could Victor be both a morning and a night person?

(Well, Yuuri was neither, so it probably made sense that someone else somewhere got the other side of the coin.)

“Hey, is everything alright?” Yuuri asked, getting to the point and awaiting the worst.

“Oh, yes, I’m doing excellent, thank you! How are you? Sorry for calling so late, is now an okay time?”

“Yes, it’s fine,” Yuuri said.

“Oh good,” Victor said. “Well, I was just thinking about this morning.”

“Oh?” Yuuri said, swallowing a lump in his throat.

“Yeah, it’s been a casual first few weeks as they wrap up pre-production, but now things are going to ramp up, you know. And I promised you I’d be something of a mentor for you, but I haven’t really taken the time,” Victor said. “Which I apologize for, I’ve distracted by your company and getting to know you. But I had an idea—to help make sure you get to set on time and so I could spend a bit more time letting you pick my brain.”

Yuuri’s throat was suddenly very dry, and the sound of acknowledgement that rose from his throat was something most similar to a squeak.

Phichit, of course, started laughing.

Yuuri pressed the phone into his shoulder.

“ _Shut up,”_ he whispered, swatting at his roommate.

“Oh, Victor is _casual_ , and I am too. We’re just _friends_ , no big deal!” Phichit said, his voice a breathy sing-song. “Yeah right, you got it as bad as ever, bud.”

“ _Shh!_ ” Yuuri hissed desperately.

When Yuuri put the phone back to his ear, Victor was already talking.

“So I’ll pick you up at 8:30, okay?”

Victor was going to—

“What?”

“Oh, should we leave a bit more time for traffic? And maybe to pick up coffee. So 8:00 then. Just text me your address.”

Yuuri’s mouth opened, and then it closed, and then it opened.

“Victor, can I—sorry—can I call you back in a minute?” Yuuri asked, helplessly.

“Huh?” Victor said. “Oh, sure, okay.”

“Great,” Yuuri said and then hastily hung up on the other man.

“Did you really just hang up on Victor Nikiforov?” Phichit asked. “And just to yell at me?”

“No,” Yuuri said. “I hung up on Victor Nikiforov because I think he wants to carpool.”

“Oh, well, that sounds like a pretty good idea.”

“Victor lives in the hills! It’s not like we’re neighbors.”

“Maybe he moved, and your little stalker blogs missed it,” Phichit shrugged. “I’m sure he wouldn’t offer if it was inconvenient.”

Yuuri wanted to say, “ _Victor Nikiforov couldn’t do something convenient if it would save his life!_ ” but he knew that would be the kind of observation that would only lead to Phichit surmising that they were both desperately trying to get into each other’s pants.

Which obviously wasn’t the case.

“What do I do?” Yuuri groaned.

“Text him our address?”

Yuuri groaned louder.

“I can’t say yes!”

“Can you say no?” Phichit countered knowingly, an eyebrow quirked.

“Agh!” Yuuri groaned a third time, falling into the couch cushions, his cry becoming muffled. “No,” he mumbled.

“Hand me your phone and I’ll rip off the band-aid for you.”

“I hate this,” Yuuri muttered into the couch cushion, but handed Phichit his phone none the less.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for all the comments and kudos! Usually you can pry my right to thank everyone individually in the comments from my cold, dead, hands, but I've gotten super behind because I've been trying to be more intentional with my time which means I spend more time doing really obnoxious things like cooking meals and meditating and trying to learn another language and going to bed at a reasonable hour and continuing to be employed, and less time doing well, anything else. It's super annoying. Pls still talk to me though, I will still somehow find the time to compulsively refresh my email every ten minutes hoping for notifications.


	5. Step on Someone Else’s Toes (Or, Victor is Suddenly Yuuri and Very Confused by It)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter is kind of long, if it's any consolation for the delay?

The first day that Victor picked Yuuri up was, as far as Victor was concerned, a disaster.

First of all, Chris was right, the traffic was not great. And Victor was late.

And then, when he got there, Yuuri was sitting on the curb in front of his building, looking impatient.

“You could have waited inside, I would have texted you,” Victor said as Yuuri got into the car.

“I didn’t want to take up anymore time,” Yuuri responded as he buckled his seatbelt and Victor cringed with shame and his throat felt like it was caving in on itself.

“Oh,” he squawked.

And then, they sat in silence all the way to the studio.

But Victor’s mind, at least, easily occupied itself as he stewed in panic.

Was Yuuri mad at him?

Victor glanced over at Yuuri, and found the other man sitting there passively, arms crossed over his chest.

“You should watch the road,” Yuuri murmured, although how he knew Victor was looking at him instead of at the road while so determinedly not looking at Victor, he didn’t know.

But oh my god, Yuuri had to be mad at him.

And Victor desperately wanted to start talking, say something dumb to make Yuuri laugh to diffuse the tension, and win back Yuuri’s favor.

But everything that occurred to Victor to say seemed too stupid to actually leave his mouth.

 _“So, how about this traffic?”_ Dumb.

 _“The first three letters on the license plate over that are DCK. Someone compensating with a vanity plate, you think?”_ Ugh, no.

 _“Did you eat breakfast?”_ There’s no way Victor could turn that into a non-awkward conversation. He might as well just ask something like—

_“So, bananas? For or against?”_

Which while perhaps a delightful and charming thing to say in a movie if the other person was scripted to find being interrogated about bananas delightful and charming, in real life could very possibly only earn him a confused stare.

And well, maybe it would be kind of a test, to see if Yuuri liked him, or wanted to like him or not. But at the same time, Victor didn’t want to test Yuuri, he wanted to—well, make a really successful movie.

And maybe other things. But mostly that. At least that’s what he’d continue to insist if anyone asked.

Unless _Yuuri_ asked. Then maybe the answer would be different.

But the longer they sat in silence, the harder it got for Victor to imagine ever being able to say anything to Yuuri ever again. None the less for Yuuri to ever say anything to him without being prompted to do so.

And as he sat there stewing, and Yuuri sat there in silence, Victor realized how quiet Yuuri a _lways_ was, and how _much_ Victor typically carried their conversations.

They often ate lunch together or chatted during down time without issue, but Victor spoke the most—frantically, desperately, manically prattling on while Yuuri would occasionally smile, or nod, or say something dismissive of Victor’s interest in him in that effortlessly cool way that only Yuuri could do. And now with Victor choked up, the conversation was non-existent.

And Victor wanted to die, just a little. Because in that moment he realized that maybe Yuuri didn’t and had never even liked him at all, not even as a friend.

Maybe Yuuri was just being polite. Maybe Yuuri wasn’t mad that Victor was late, he was mad at Victor for showing up at all.

But, even through the soul crushing terror, Victor couldn’t help but take another glance over at Yuuri again, and once again get caught up in staring. Because honestly, it was amazing to see—Yuuri just _sat there_ for forty-five minutes. Not only did he not try to make conversation, or even try to turn on the radio, he didn’t even look at his phone.

He just sat there, staring out the window, for forty-five minutes. His face was so intent, yet passive. His eyes both somehow cold and sharp, but warm and soft.

And Victor didn’t know how he did it, because sitting there in silence driving a car in heavy rush hour traffic made Victor nearly lose his mind, and his stylist was going to have to work extra hard today because his hair was a mess from running his hands through it out of nerves and frustration, and he probably had bags under his eyes from waking up before the sun to pull off this stunt

Victor pretty notoriously did not have a lot of patience. 

But maybe Yuuri was really into meditation. Maybe he typically used his morning car rides to practice. And Victor’s effort to, well, whatever this was (be helpful—that had been the intention, right?), was ruining his routine.

But they skipped the coffee run to make up time, made it to the studio without facing the wrath of the director, and then, for the first day since the start of filming, Victor did not see Yuuri again for the entire day.

And it was probably just a coincidence of their schedules. It wasn’t, in fact, like they would be filming every scene of the movie together. And today, Victor was filming by himself. And Yuuri was off—doing god knows what. He had some meetings, or something, and then they were trying to get some of his ADR out of the way early, or something? And then he was probably just hanging out in his trailer, or something, in between.

But he probably wasn’t avoiding Victor, explicitly.

But a part of Victor wondered if Yuuri was just sitting around, why he wasn’t sitting around on the edge of set to watch Victor.

Which was a stupid and unfair request for Victor to make of Yuuri. But, well, that apparently didn’t stop Victor from wanting it.

But he needed to stop worrying about Yuuri and do his fucking job. He told Yuuri that they would make the movie good together, and he needed to uphold his end of the bargain and not sleepwalk through scenes because his mind was stuck elsewhere.

When his lunch came around, Victor couldn’t find Yuuri anywhere, which was another blow. It was three in the afternoon by the time they finally took a break from shooting, so Victor imagined that Yuuri had eaten much earlier.

But they ate lunch together almost every day. There was a little seating area behind where their trailers were, a couple benches jammed into an alley between two buildings where they would sit by themselves, away from the hustle and noise of everyone else in the cast and crew and eat together.

But still, Victor stood knocking at Yuuri’s trailer door, holding the box containing his salad in one hand  and two bottles of seltzer water in the other, hoping that maybe Yuuri would be able to come and join him anyway. If not to eat, then just for the company. But there was no response.

And Victor couldn’t help but imagine Yuuri inside the trailer, getting a peak at Victor through a slit in the blinds, and ducking down and being really quiet, making a point to ignore Victor. He imagined the shots, the way the camera would film it, flipping back and forth between the two of them, both of them holding their breath but for different reasons.

And now, that _probably_ wasn’t what was happening. Yuuri probably was actually just busy.

But, still, Victor could see it in his mind. And after a few moments of waiting, he sighed, and metaphorically stuck his tail between his legs. And then, too ashamed to head back to the makeshift cafeteria tent where the rest of the cast and crew were eating, he went over to his and Yuuri’s bench to eat alone.

*

“So, are you keeping it a secret?” Sara asked, sitting down across from where Yuuri was eating his lunch, on what Yuuri had come to think of as his and Victor’s bench. Victor was still filming, though, so today Yuuri ate alone. Or he was trying to until Sara came and found him.

“What?” Yuuri asked, his mouth full of carrot stick and his mind spinning with worry as he tried to remember if there were any secrets that he was trying to keep that he should panic about having gotten out.

But besides the fact that he was an ill-prepared fraud, he couldn’t think of anything.

“You and Victor?” Sara said, and Yuuri’s brow only furrowed.

“What would we have to keep a secret?” he asked.

“Oh, come on, you can tell me,” she insisted, lightly slapping his arm as she collapsed down on the bench beside him. “Both of you came to work together this morning, you aren’t being very discrete. Don’t think everyone is already gossiping about it.”

Yuuri rubbed his arm defensively. People were gossiping about him and Victor carpooling?

“I’m sorry, I’m really not following.”

Sara just rolled her eyes and let out a disgruntled sounding sigh.

“Okay, fine, don’t own up, but just blink twice if he’s good in bed.”

Yuuri’s eyes did the opposite of blinking as they expanded to the size of saucers as he gaped at Sara as her implications all finally made sense.

And now it was Sara’s brow that furrowed in surprise.

“Oh my god, so you _aren’t_ feigning cluelessness then?”

“Victor and I aren’t—” Yuuri squawked, unable to even finish the sentence. All the options felt too preposterous to even deny— _“Having sex.” “Sleeping together.” “Fucking.”_ Even just, _“Together.”_

“We’re just carpooling,” Yuuri said instead after a pause. “I don’t have a car. Or a license.”

“Why not just use the studio’s car service then?” she asked, looking contemplative.

“There’s a studio car service?” Yuuri asked.

Sara just blinked at him, like it was obvious.

Well, Yuuri certainly hadn’t known.

“So, Victor heard that you didn’t have a car and offered to drive you?”

“Yeah?”

“Where do you live?”

“Echo Park.”

The smile that developed on Sara’s face was almost devilish.

“What?” Yuuri asked. “I know it’s not close to where he lives, but he was so insistent. And my roommate said that he wouldn’t have offered if it was inconvenient, so I mean—” Yuuri stammered.

Sara just kept smiling at him.

“I wouldn’t worry about it,” she said. “He wouldn’t have offered if he didn’t want to. Is he driving you home too?”

“Oh, um, I don’t know, maybe? He might be finishing late tonight though with filming, so maybe I’ll just call a car.”

“You should wait for him,” Sara said. “If you don’t have plans. It will only be an hour or so waiting around.”

“Okay?” Yuuri said, unsure.

“Good,” she nodded, snatching the cup of carrots and hummus that Yuuri had been eating as she stood up from the bench. “Payment for my services,” she explained.

Yuuri didn’t have it in him to ask what that meant.

*

It was almost eight o’clock when Victor finally wrapped filming. It had been an absurdly long day. And as much as he tried, as it grew later and they kept reshooting the same last fucking goddamn scene they had scheduled to shoot that day, Victor’s performance only got worse as he thought of Yuuri more.

And when finally Victor had gotten his act together and the director seemed satisfied, Victor knew that Yuuri had probably found his own way home. And he was wandering across the lot to his trailer to grab his stuff and head to the garage to pick up his car, feeling terribly deflated, when someone caught him by the arm.

“Are you going to pick up Yuuri?” a woman asked, and Victor turned to see Sara.

“What?” Victor asked.

“Yuuri. You’re carpooling right?” she said, and it was instantly incredibly obvious to Victor just by the tone of her voice that she had somehow caught on to Victor’s little ridiculous ruse to win Yuuri’s affections.

“Yeah,” Victor said. “But he had his last meeting hours ago at this point, he probably left.”

“You should check, just to make sure,” she said, still looking like she saw right through him.

“Okay,” Victor shrugged, still dubious. But Sara, seeming satisfied with that, dropped his arm and walked off.

Victor watched her walk away before going to fish his phone out of his pocket.

 _Do you still need a ride?_ He mustered up the courage to send a text asking.

A reply didn’t come, and Victor sighed, making his way to Yuuri’s trailer, figuring he could knock just in case.

He stood on the step, imagining that instead of standing at the door of a tin motor home on a studio backlot, he was standing at the door of a home, and a camera captured him from behind at a distance, his body a small silhouette standing in the falling dusk, hand dramatically falling to his side—the only movement in the stillness of the shot—after giving a few quiet, pessimistic raps at the door.

He was about to turn away, facing back toward the invisible camera. He was imagining the scene he was about to act out—him, head hung and dragging his feet defeatedly as he walked away—when the door swung open.

“Sorry, I just saw your text when I heard the knocking, I figured I’d just answer,” Yuuri said.

Victor felt some kind of way as he took Yuuri in. He looked different than he had this morning, the twelve-hour day had apparently unraveled him as the button-down shirt that had been buttoned this morning was undone to reveal a thread-bare t-shirt, his previously slickly styled hair hung messily in his face, and his feet were stuffed in a pair of the most ridiculous hamster shaped over sized slippers that he had ever seen.

He’d ask about them another day, though, Victor decided. Yuuri looked tired, and Victor felt like he was in mourning, and it didn’t really feel like the time.

“Have you been waiting for me long?” he asked instead.

“I had some work I could do here, and it’s not like I had anywhere pressing to be. I might as well hang out here for a while instead of at home and save the cab fare.” Yuuri shrugged, and Victor’s heart sank a little bit at the implication that he was just a cost-saving budgeting strategy. “I still need to get my stuff together though before we leave, want to come in?”

Victor still needed to go get his car keys from his trailer, and could have offered to meet Yuuri outside, but for some reason he completely forgot that at the offer to enter Yuuri’s trailer.

Victor hadn’t been inside Yuuri’s trailer yet, and he was suddenly desperate to sneak a look. Previously, if they were ever together and Yuuri needed to grab something, Victor was shut out, left standing outside to wait while Yuuri disappeared inside. And if they had downtime together, they’d hang out in Victor’s trailer, find hidden nooks like their bench, or something, but they never went inside Yuuri’s trailer for some reason.

It turns out, possibly, that was because it wasn’t that interesting, and Victor’s was slightly nicer.

The trailer was incredibly standard, in fact. It didn’t look like Yuuri had made a ton of special requests or decorated it at all. The only noteworthy thing was the massive pile of books and paper spread out on the table.

“Are you in school?” Victor asked as he caught sight of it.

Yuuri was young, but he thought Yuuri had graduated before he had started his first and most recent film project. Or that’s at least what his Wikipedia page had said. But maybe Yuuri had secrets. Maybe Victor barely even knew Yuuri at all, despite the time they’d been spending together.

“Oh, no,” Yuuri said, glancing at the spread. “At least not formally. I just… I’m so new to this, I don’t want to be making any stupid mistakes,” he said.

“I don’t think you’re making any stupid mistakes,” Victor said gently, without thinking too much and before he could talk himself out of it.

“No, I’m starting to see that,” Yuuri shrugged, looking at the ground. “Although, actually, me staying late is probably just enabling me. I’m not doing any reading at home anymore because Phichit threatened to burn all my books if he caught me up studying in the middle of the night one more time. And he was right.”

“Oh,” Victor said. “And Phichit is your?”

“Roommate,” Yuuri said, and then seemed to catch himself. “Or well, best friend. He’d be mad at me for reducing him to a roommate.”

“Ah.”

“Okay,” Yuuri said, after tidying the mess or books for a moment and grabbing his bag. “I’m good to go.”

“Um, your shoes?” Victor asked, glancing down at Yuuri’s feet.

“Oh!” Yuuri gasped and ducked his head to hide his blush. “Right, sorry,” he said as he toed off the slippers and traded them with a pair of shoes that were by the door. “They were a gift from Phichit before I started filming _Ice Masters_.”

“They’re cute,” Victor offered, feeling himself going alarmingly mute again, which was annoying because Yuuri seemed to be open to talking, “We just have to swing by my trailer to grab my keys.”

“Okay,” Yuuri nodded.

And then, because Victor was cursed, that was the last thing he and Yuuri said to each other, until a little while later when Yuuri was looking at Victor through the open car door that Yuuri now stood on the other side of, standing in the parking lot of Yuuri’s building.

“I’ll see you tomorrow morning?” Victor managed to ask, although, at this point he fully expected Yuuri to say no.

But then Yuuri just smiled, although it seemed a little tight.

“Sure,” he said. “Thanks for driving me today.”

Now it was Victor’s turn to smile a little too tightly.

“It’s my pleasure.”

And then after the kind of pause of a moment where Victor felt like he should have added something important, or anything else at all, but instead could say nothing, Yuuri shut the car door and walked away.

*

“I’m not sure Victor likes me,” Yuuri said immediately in response when Phichit asked Yuuri how his day went.

“Oh?” Phichit asked.

“Today was really weird.”

“How so?” Phichit pushed, as he was so used to doing in conversation with Yuuri in order to get anywhere.

“We didn’t talk, like, at all. And usually he doesn’t shut up, and I’m the one left awkwardly fumbling through the conversation. But today, he was Mr. Monosyllabic Man? And because I’m me, that means we barely spoke at all.”

“Is something the matter at home?” Phichit asked.

Yuuri shrugged. “I don’t know. I don’t know if he’d tell me if something was.”

“Maybe he was just having an off day or had something on his mind. I wouldn’t worry about it too much,” Phichit said, rubbing Yuuri’s arm reassuringly. “But you know, you could push him a bit to see if he’ll open up. I know it’s not super you, but sometimes when we want to have relationships with other people, we do have to try and be slightly more vulnerable people than we have the instinct to be.”

Yuuri sighed.

“Yeah, okay, maybe.”

“Have you eaten anything?”

“I stole a bunch of snacks from the crafty table, I’m good.”

“I don’t think it’s stealing, babe,” Phichit said. “But do you think you’ll make it home for dinner tomorrow night?” he asked.

Sensing a shift in Phichit’s energy, Yuuri turned to look at his friend.

“Yeah, it shouldn’t be a very long day for either Victor and me. I’m only in one of the two scenes they want to shoot, and I think Victor is going through one last rehearsal for some stunt work they’re going to get to in the next couple of days.”

“Good, because I was thinking it would be a good night for some katsudon,” Phichit said, with a grin that was trying to be coy, but failing.

“What happened?” Yuuri asked.

“You know that internship program that I was waitlisted for last month, that cinematography program?”

Yuuri beamed.

“Did you get a spot?”

Phichit’s smile grew wider and he nodded.

“Oh that’s amazing Phichit!” he exclaimed. “Yes, we can definitely make some katsudon tomorrow.”

“Excellent,” Phichit said. “And you know, if you wanted to invite a certain suddenly down-seeming movie star over for dinner I wouldn’t mind.”

“But katsudon is our thing.”

“Katsudon is your thing, Yuuri. You can share it with whoever you want. Do you want to with Victor?”

“I’m not sure I’m ready to have him here.”

“Oh sure, Mr. I’m-Going-To-Sit-On-The-Curb-for-Half-An-Hour rather than have to deal with the Victor Nikiforov seeing my house.”

“I let him into my trailer tonight!” Yuuri defended.

And he had. He previously hadn’t. He didn’t see the point. Victor’s trailer seemed so thoughtfully put together, all these accommodations made to his taste that showed how important he was. Yuuri’s trailer was basic and boring and a little messy. He didn’t want to give Victor any reminders that he was far too common and boring as well.

And he could only imagine what Victor, who surely lived in some big well decorated house,  would think of his and Phichit’s IKEA decorated two-bedroom apartment. As long as Victor didn’t see the actual state of his life, maybe Yuuri could pretend that he was maintaining some illusion that he was possibly even remotely on Victor’s level.

“And you’re what, on the third week of shooting? Aren’t you going abroad in like, a few weeks?”

That was true. They were, technically speaking, about half way done with their LA portion of filming, barring any reshoots. Then they’d be going to be going to China for a few weeks.

“Look, I’m just saying it’s an option, you know.”

“I’ll think about it, okay?” Yuuri said. “But who knows if he’d even want to.

“I have a feeling he’d say yes in an instant,”

“Mm,” Yuuri hummed and said nothing else.

Phichit sighed.

“But with the internship, that means I’ll be busy while you’re gone. Not going to be sitting around in an empty apartment for weeks,” Phichit said, changing the topic.

Yuuri laughed.

“Oh, if I’m relieved it should be that maybe you’ll be too tired to throw any of the parties here that you don’t usually throw out of consideration for me.”

“You’ve always maintained a don’t ask, don’t tell policy about things like that. If you wanted to know, I’d tell you all about how when you were in Europe for _Ice Masters_ , I hooked up with this really hot guy right on the—”

“Nope!” Yuuri said. “Enough! You’re a virgin. I’m a virgin. Within our relationship, we are both virgins!”

Phichit rolled his eyes and sighed dramatically.

“If you insist, we can _both_ lie to ourselves about each other.”

“Thank you,” Yuuri said. “That’s all I’ve ever asked.

“Although,” Phichit said mischievously, “Someday, if you and Victor are ever looking for a third, remember me.”

Yuuri, even after living with Phichit all these years and very used to his suggestiveness, still, blushing and flustered and muttering insistent denials, threw a throw pillow at Phichit.

*

The second day that Victor picked Yuuri up didn’t go any better than the first.

And Victor felt a little unsettled.

The car ride had been silent again, but this time it was apparent that it was Victor who was dropping the ball.

Because Yuuri had gotten into the car and had turned to look at Victor with piercingly earnest eyes, and asked, “How are you this morning?”

And Victor had stammered “Fine,” and accidently revved the engine too loudly as he sped a little too quickly out of the parking lot of Yuuri’s building.

And Victor didn’t know what on earth was wrong with him. But, none the less, it was becoming apparent that somehow, Yuuri had broken him.

And every day now that he remained broken, his relationship with Yuuri was inevitably deteriorating.

Because Yuuri sat in silence for another forty-five minutes this morning and when they got to the lot, they went their separate ways with little more than a few awkward words.

And Victor didn’t know what the fuck to do.

So instead, he did about the only thing he could think of.

He went to his trailer and called Chris.

“Where you today?” Victor asked the second Chris said hello.

“I’m at home,” Chris said. “I’m bed actually,” he said in a way that made it glaringly obvious he was not alone.

“Can you drive to set and slap some sense into me?”

Chris laughed.

“Does this have something to do with a certain male co-star of yours?”

“Duh,” Victor said. “And he’s turned me into a mess, and I need to snap out of it!” he proclaimed.

“How is the carpooling going?”

“We sit in silence for the entire ride.”

“Oh dear,” Chris said. “Have you tried, you know, talking to him?”

“That’s the thing,” Victor paced across his trailer. “I’m all clammed up. I can’t get myself to say more than two words to him.”

“Sounds like you have a crush,” Chris said casually.

“We’re not talking about things like that,” Victor said quickly.

“And why not? Yuuri, if you can manage to nab him, is pretty textbook boyfriend material. Okay, maybe he could be a couple inches taller, if you’re being super picky, but otherwise he makes the criteria for most of even the pickiest man’s list.”

“I can’t go there Chris. We have like six weeks left of production.”

“And then what?”

“I—I don’t know.”

“Don’t tell me you aren’t picturing moving him into your house out of that pathetic apartment of his?”

“Chris. Just tell me how to get through the day.”

“You pull your head out of your ass and talk to him. Or don’t talk to him but put your tongue into _his_ ass.”

“Chris!” Victor said, scandalized. “I swear to god—”

“Okay, okay. Why don’t you do something with him outside of work that’s not sitting in a car? Ask him to go for drinks or something.”

“I don’t want to ply him with alcohol to have a conversation!”

“You don’t have to get him drunk, but you know, we have inhibitions that sometimes need lowering, okay? Even if he doesn’t drink, maybe you need one. Or like, I don’t know, go to a basketball game or see a movie and give yourselves a reason to sit in silence but have something to talk about afterwards. Okay. And this can all just be in a friendly way. Invite his roommate too, if it makes you feel less awkward. Phichit is probably in your corner. Or I’ll come along, but do you really want that?”

Victor exhaled.

“Okay,” he said. “Okay, I think I can do that.”

“Clearly if you can cut the tension yourself, you’re going to need something else to for you. What’s that quote about idiots doing the same thing and expecting different results?”

Victor sighed.

“That’s about the gist of it.”

Victor could tell Chris was rolling his eyes.

“Alright darling, are you feeling better?”

“I guess.”

“Good. Now your tongue may be tied, but I believe mine does have better things to do.”

Now Victor rolled his eyes.

“Have fun, Chris.”

“I always do, baby. I’d recommend you try it more.”

*

Victor finished for the morning and went to pick up some lunch from catering before hesitantly making his way across the lot to his and Yuuri’s bench.

He got there and saw it was empty, and his heart sank a bit, but he sat down anyway.

He hoped, of course, that Yuuri would show up still. Yuuri was the one shooting this morning, but his scene was shorter and only one, compared to the couple of long ones Victor had been marathoned through yesterday.

But the minutes passed by, and Victor sat alone. Frustrated, he stuffed half of his sandwich into his mouth.

“You hungry?” a familiar voice asked, and Victor’s head snapped up to see Yuuri, standing before him with his own cardboard container of lunch in his hands.

“Mm,” Victor responded, his mouth so stuffed his cheeks were distended. Yuuri smiled patiently and sat down beside him will Victor frantically chewed and swallowed.

“I mean,” Victor said, mouth now empty. “I really should ask them to stop carrying these sandwiches, it takes everything in me not to eat two every day,” he said, looking down at the second half of his Porchetta sandwich, and mentally celebrating for being able to talk like a normal person for the first time in two days to Yuuri.

“You can eat half of mine,” Yuuri said, opening his take-out container to reveal the same sandwich.

“Don’t you want it?” Victor asked.

“My roommate got accepted into an internship program he applied to this summer,” Yuuri said, “So tonight I’m going to make katsudon, er a pork cutlet bowl, to celebrate. I should save room,” Yuuri shrugged.

Oh, so asking Yuuri for drinks tonight wasn’t an option. But then thinking about it more, Victor perked up, cautiously because any second now the muteness could come back, but hoping they’d fallen back into their old groove.

“Oh?” he asked, hoping he didn’t sound too eager, but knowing that he was failing. “What is that, exactly?”

“It’s like fried pork with rice and vegetables and egg. It’s my favorite food, but it’s not the kind of thing that’s very healthy to begin with, and it’s practically sacrilegious to not eat just a heaping bowl of it, so it’s pretty indulgent. I only eat it to celebrate things. Usually my things, but Phichit it’s kind of spread a bit.”

“Oh, I’d love to try that sometime!” Victor said. A part of him hoped that Yuuri would invite him over for dinner.

(No, that was not true. All of Victor was shamelessly trying to get himself invited over for dinner. He was only following Chris’s advice, after all. Right?)

“I haven’t found restaurant in L.A. that makes it right yet,” Yuuri said matter-of-factly and Victor for a second crumpled, before deciding maybe to be a bit heavier handed.

“Well then you’ll just have to make it for me!”

Yuuri looked confused or possibly slightly insulted.

“My mom makes it better than I do.”

Did Yuuri—want Victor to meet his mother? No, no, that couldn’t be the leap he was trying to make there.

“Oh. Um.” Victor said, and cursed, well everything in the entire goddamn universe for stammering once again.

But then he looked up at Yuuri and saw that he looked, well, a bit like Victor felt.

“If you want, I can bring you leftovers, if there are any, I guess,” Yuuri said after a moment. “I usually make too much, and try to eat it all anyway, which I really shouldn’t,” he said. “It won’t be as good not fresh, but ah, I have a nice thermal lunchbox set my mother sent me from Japan while I was in school. I’m probably more qualified to bring you bento than I am to get you coffee anyway.”

“Oh?” Victor said, trying to hide his excitement. “You really wouldn’t mind?”

“No, it’s no problem,” Yuuri said.

“And we’ll have it for lunch tomorrow?”

“Sure,” Yuuri smiled cautiously.

“Excellent,” Victor smiled broadly.

It wasn’t quite what Chris had suggested, but it was some kind of step, Victor was sure.

And he couldn’t help but imagine the shot of him and Yuuri sitting on the bench smiling at each other zooming out and fading to black.

*

“Yuuri, I swear to god, it is five in the fucking morning, and I told you I would burn your books if I caught you up studying one more time!” Phichit said, storming out to the room at a loud noise from the kitchen.

He rounded the corner though to find Yuuri in the kitchen, surrounded by the wreckage of a spilled bag of rice that had fallen out of the cabinet.

“Um,” Phichit said as he took in the scene. “What are you doing?”

“Making katsudon?” Yuuri said, sounding unsure of himself.

“Why?” Phichit asked.

It was five in the morning, after all. And they had leftovers from last night in the fridge.

“Because it’s better fresh,” Yuuri said, bending down to sweep up the rise after turning around to pull a dustpan out of the closet.

“And why do you need fresh katsudon at five in the morning?”

Yuuri glanced up at his roommate nervously and then quickly looked back down and got back to sweeping.

“Oh no, Yuuri, you’re not getting out of this. I’m away now and probably won’t be able to get back to sleep. You owe me answers.”

Yuuri muttered something while staying focused on the ground.

“What was that?”

“Because I’m making it for Victor for lunch,” Yuuri said, louder.

“Ah,” Phichit smiled. “Why?”

“Because I’m a coward who couldn’t invite him over for dinner last night, so instead I compromised by telling him I’d bring him katsudon for lunch.”

Phichit laughed as he squatted down to help Yuuri sweep up the rice.

“You’re a disaster, child,” he said.

Yuuri sucked his lip between his teeth.

“You want to help me make bento?”

Phichit couldn’t help but laugh again.

“Anything for you.”

*

Victor was definitely, one-hundred-and-ten percent going to talk to Yuuri this morning.

He’d spent all of last night making a list of questions he wanted to ask Yuuri and conversation topics and had memorized them like they were a script.

He was going to break their streak of silence. Because if he didn’t, he would go insane and probably seek medical attention because this behavior was not at all like him.

“Good morning,” he started with, leaning across the front seat to push open the door for Yuuri.

“Morning,” Yuuri said back.

“How was your dinner last night?” he asked, going immediately for the follow up, saying it off like the conversation was scripted as he pulled out of the parking lot.

“It was good,” Yuuri said. “Um,” he added after a pause like he’d forgotten his line and Victor for a second wondered if Yuuri had been able to read his mind. “How was your evening?”

He imagined them, both, staying up late last night, lying in separate beds but unknowingly studying their lines for separate halves of the same conversation, camera shooting them both from above, flashing quickly between the parallel scenes.

“It was good,” he said, without follow up because he certainly wasn’t going to tell Yuuri that he’d been studying for this conversation like Yuuri studied to learn how to act.

Which was ridiculous that Yuuri studied acting like he needed it, but that was a thought for another day.

“So, have you ever thought about learning to drive?”

“I’ve considered it, the longer I’ve been here. But I don’t love the concept and I’ve never really had time,” Yuuri shrugged. “LA traffic kind of freaks me out in particular,” he said, and as if it was summoned, Victor struggled to merge onto a jam-packed highway that was barely crawling.

Victor looked out as far as he could see to see cars nearly backed up for miles.

“Well, it usually isn’t this bad,” Victor observed.

“Yeah,” Yuuri said. “Wonder if there was an accident,” Yuuri asked as traffic came to a standstill.

“You want to check your phone for traffic reports?” Victor asked.

Yuuri nodded and pulled out his phone.

“Ah, it’s not great. The phrase ‘six car pile-up’ is involved,” Yuuri reported. “Delays are in the forty-five minute to an hour kind of time frame at least.”

“Ah,” Victor said, putting the car into park. “Maybe not the best morning to skip breakfast, then.”

Yuuri pursed his lips and Victor felt the awkward silence falling when suddenly Yuuri spoke—

“Well, I do have some katsudon. We were supposed to have it for lunch, but I’d be lying if I said I hadn’t eaten it for breakfast before.”

“You want to eat your katsudon parked in traffic at 8:30 AM?”

Yuuri shrugged and pulled an insulated satchel out of his bag.

“Yes? No?” he said, opening it up to take out two metal containers. “It’s better fresher, anyway.”

This was not something that Victor had scripted, and for a second, he wasn’t sure what to say.

But it only took a few seconds for him to shake himself out of it and remember that some of the most memorable movie moments are improvised.

“Alright,” he said. “Sure.”

Yuuri handed him one of the containers and a pair of chopsticks and Victor popped the lid off the container.

“Wow!” he said, looking at the carefully arranged meal. “This looks amazing. This is the nicest thing I’ve ever eaten!

“Try it first,” Yuuri said with a laugh.

Victor did, and it was delicious.

“Vkusno!”

“Is that good?” Yuuri asked.

“Very good!” Victor said, stuffing another bite into his mouth even though his mouth was still full from the first one.

“Can you teach me how to say something in Russian?” Yuuri asked suddenly, and Victor had wondered if maybe Yuuri had spent last night scripting conversations after all, because Victor had planned to ask Yuuri to teach him Japanese. Although he wasn’t prepared for the other way around.

“What do you want to learn to say?” he asked.

“I don’t know, something useful, probably.”

“Ya lyublyu tebya,” Victor said, probably without putting as much thought into it as he should have.

“Ya lyublyu tebya,” Yuuri repeated and Victor’s heart skipped a little treacherously.

“What does that mean?” Yuuri asked. “Something like ‘How are you?’” he guessed.

“No,” Victor said. “But just as useful, I think.”

“What do you like to eat?” Yuuri guessed again.

Victor laughed.“It’s not a question,” he shook his head. “No,” he chuckled and paused. “It means I love you.”

For a second, Yuuri froze.

“Oh,” he said, softly. “I could see how that’s useful.”

“Yes,” Victor said. And then traffic started to inch forwards ahead of them.

“We should move,” Yuuri said, pointing it out.

“Yes,” Victor repeated. “Alright.”

And then, after putting the car in drive, they inched forwards.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone happens to be up for talking a twenty-something who has become annoyingly passive when it comes to making decisions about their life (me) into making decisions, hit me up. 
> 
> Otherwise, I hope you're doing well and let me know what you think and I'll update when I can :)
> 
> Also, asking someone their opinion on bananas is kind of similar to a thing I actually did for years, which was ask new people I’ve recently met about their opinion on pigeons. Which is something that while I’m sure could be charming in movies, gets a lot of confusion in real life.


End file.
